India and China sign win-win deal, ending border dispute

Ranjit Devraj, IPS/New Delhi

Asian giants India and China buried four decades of bitterness over their common Himalayan border by signing agreements that provide for "early" settlement of the dispute. The accords also allow both countries to build a partnership based on peace and prosperity.

Chinese Prime Minister Wen Jiabao and his Indian counterpart Manmohan Singh signed a historic joint statement on Monday and witnessed their officials signing 12 accords, one of which was for making "meaningful and mutually acceptable adjustments" at disputed points along their 3,000 kilometer-long border.

"We're going to put in place a bridge of friendship linking our two countries, a bridge that will lead both of us to the future," a beaming Wen said before the signing ceremony.

Wen also indicated during talks with Singh that Beijing would now depart from its stated positions on the expansion of the United Nations Security Council and support India's candidature as a permanent member of the body.

Special representatives M.K. Narayanan, who is India's National Security Adviser, and Chinese Executive Vice Foreign Minister Dai Bingguo, agreed to give due consideration to each other's "strategic and reasonable interests", and observe the principle of mutual and equal security paving the way for lasting peace between the neighbours.

Relations between the two Asian giants were frozen after both fought a brief but bloody war in 1962. Since then, neither side was willing to compromise on their respective positions.

Nonetheless, Monday's joint statement was a breakthrough. Both sides are convinced that an "early settlement of the boundary question will advance the basic interests of the two countries and should, therefore, be pursued as a strategic objective."

The deal is expected to remove years of suspicion and even hostility that saw trade between the neighbors limited to less than US$3 billion. The new accords are expected to boost business between Beijing and New Delhi, and experts expect at least $30 billion of trade to flow between the two.

Wen called upon both countries to "refuse to let questions left over from history disrupt and impede the development of bilateral relations."

For India that would mean giving up forever its policy of supporting the Tibetan independence struggle that began in 1959 when the Dalai Lama and thousands of his followers fled over the Himalayas to set up a government-in-exile in the host country.

Seeing the drift of things the Dalai Lama himself said on Mar. 10, marking the 46th anniversary of the failed Tibetan uprising against Chinese rule that he and his followers were "willing to remain within the people's Republic of China" and not seek independence for Tibet.

In return, China has formally accepted Indian sovereignty over the former Buddhist kingdom of Sikkim and is expected to acknowledge Indian control over 35,000 square km of Himalayan territory that falls in the Indian state of Arunachal Pradesh.

Adjustments are expected to be made in the 16,500-square- kilometer Aksai Chin area of Kashmir on the edge of the Tibetan peninsula that was seized by China during the 1962 war.

Analysts have said Beijing's new eagerness in mending fences with India may have been prompted by the growing closeness between India and the United States which have included offers from Washington to supply frontline fighters and plans for joint- patrols in the Straits of Malacca.

China's ambassador to India, Sun Yuxi, has been quoted as saying that while Beijing had no issue with close ties between New Delhi and Washington, "Indo-U.S. ties should not be directed against a third country."

But what may finally cement renewed ties between two of the world's oldest civilisations is the fact that they have both emerged as global players in information technology (IT) with ample opportunities for the two to compliment each other in the lucrative industry.

While China excels in hardware manufacture it can use Indian prowess in software and design. By coming together, both would be able to drastically bring down global prices for IT products and increase access for the millions still left out in the information hub.

Accompanying officials observed that Singh and Wen were only reviving an age old "civilisational dialogue" that has seen India "exporting" Buddhism and philosophy to China and freely trading and exchanging ideas and concepts since the first millennium.