India mustn't live in illusions of talks on Doklam standoff during BRICS meet: Chinese daily

Beijing: With all eyes set on the BRICS summit in September in Beijing where both India and China will formally face each other after the Sikkim standoff row, Chinese experts said India should not live in illusion of any talks with China on the issue.

Chinese state-run media, Global Times in an article quoted an expert, Chen Fengying, saying that “If India hopes to discuss this issue during the summit, they'll have to think again,” adding that there will not be any discussion of the standoff at any multilateral occasion, or even during bilateral occasions.

Chen Fengying is a former Director of the Institute of World Economy, under the China Institutes of Contemporary International Relations.

The article quoting Fenying said that “China won’t allow border tensions with India to impact the upcoming BRICS summit, and the issue might not even be mentioned as India has not met China's preconditions for dialogue”.

The military standoff which enters into its third month in August began with India opposing to China’s road construction in Doklam, a disputed tri-junction point between India-Bhutan-China, basically belongs to Bhutan but allegedly claimed by China as its territory.

Global Times known for its strong criticism against India, said quoting Chinese observers that China would not make concessions to India while it is sabotaging Chinese sovereignty.

Chinese media also refuted India and International media reports that the standoff between two neighbours will over shadow the main purpose of BRICS summit and denied media reports of China taking soft stance or back route to ease the tensions.

Meanwhile, another expert, Hu Zhiyong, a research fellow at the Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences, said the BRICS summit is a multilateral meeting for cooperation between rising economies rather than an emergency meeting for conflict mediation between two countries, Global Times reported.

Reiterating its stand of urging India to withdraw its troops from the Doklam as precondition for dialogue, Chinese international strategist, Ye Hailin, said “China won't mention the border issue on any occasion at the summit, not even in bilateral meetings with India”, Global times said in an article.

Noting a point that the BRICS summit has always been fruitful for India, Qian Feng, an expert at the Chinese Association for South Asian Studies, said in statement that “India will not abandon this platform since it also needs to gain international support and achieve cooperation with other BRICS countries.”

Stating that India has gained some meaningful achievements from the summit last year, the Global Times article said India and Russia signed a USD 5 billion deal for an S-400 air defence system on the sidelines of the 2016 BRICS Summit in Goa. Similarly, it also gained counter-terrorism support from other BRICS members in last year's summit, including China.

On Monday, Indian Home Minister, Rajanth Singh hoping for positive resolution earliest of the ongoing Sikkim standoff said, “I believe there will be a solution soon. I hope China will undertake a positive initiative.”