Indians both in the country and in China are facing the twin challenges of a pandemic and aggression at the border, India’s ambassador to China Vikram Misri said on Saturday, adding that citizens have to be united to face the challenge.
Addressing a gathering of Indians at India House on a muggy Beijing morning to mark India’s 74th Indepence Day, Misri said: “As… you just heard from the President’s (President Ram Nath Kovind’ Independence Day eve) address, 2020 has been a very unusual year, including for us here in China. We here, and people in India, of course, have had to face up to the twin challenges of Covid-19 as well as aggression on our borders.”
Referring to the twin challenges, Misri said facing up to them would require both effort and sacrifices.
As India’s ambassador to China, Misri has been at the centre of India’s efforts to keep channels of communication open on the boundary question in the opaque corridors of power in the Chinese capital.
Besides reaching out to other embassies and diplomats stationed in Beijing on New Delhi’s position on the border, Misri held two meetings this week with a senior functionary of the Communist Party of China (CPC) and senior officer of the Central Military Commission (CMC), which administers the Chinese armed forces.
Misri’s meeting with Maj Gen Ci Guowei, director of CMC’s office of international military cooperation on Friday, came two days after the envoy met Liu Jianchao, deputy director of the CPC central committee’s foreign affairs commission.