Devirupa Mitra
Indian Express
September 27, 2014
Prime Minister Narendra Modi greets people outside his hotel upon his arrival in New York on Friday | pti
Prime Minister Narendra Modi greets people outside his hotel upon his arrival in New York on Friday | pti NEW YORK: It took an half-an-hour long meeting between External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj and her Chinese counterpart here to seemingly bring an end to the 15-day stand-off at the Jammu and Kashmir border, with both sides agreeing to a timeline to start withdrawal of troops from Saturday and
completely revert to the earlier status quo at the border by September 30.
Swaraj, who has been running from one meeting to another after arriving here on Wednesday, met with Wang Yi in the UN headquarters on Thursday afternoon.
“Both ministers have decided on the timeline. The withdrawal will start on September 26 and will be completed by September 30 to return to the status quo of September 1,” Swaraj told Indian media representatives after her meeting with foreign ministers of South Africa and Brazil as part of the IBSA forum.
For the first time, India admitted publicly that the border stand-off did impact the atmospherics surrounding the Chinese leader’s state visit earlier in September.
“..uska chaaya us pe par raha tha (it did cast a shadow),” Swaraj said, adding that it was a pity especially since the Chinese president’s visit was otherwise fruitful. Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s forthcoming arrival on his first trip to the US must have certainly played a role in agreeing to the withdrawal timeline — with Beijing not eager to see India pushed into a closer relationship with Washington.
China had looked on uneasily as India and Japan flirted with each other ever since Shinzo Abe became Prime Minister. While it knows that India-China relations suffer from trust deficit, it also does not want to push New Delhi to join any anti-China ‘coalition’ in Asia.
Swaraj’s announcement came after a flag meeting at Chumar ended positively on Thursday evening, India time.
Meanwhile, in late development, Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif on Friday raked up the Kashmir issue at the UN General Assembly and blamed India for “another missed opportunity” to address outstanding issues by cancelling the Foreign Secretary-level talks.
Asserting that a “veil” cannot be drawn over the “core” issue of Kashmir, he said Pakistan is ready to work for resolution of this problem through negotiations. Needling India, Sharif said that more than six decades ago, the UN had passed resolutions to hold a plebiscite in J&K.
