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Chinese Premier Li Qiang attends a meeting with Asian Development Bank (ADB) President Masatsugu Asakawa, unseen, at Beijing’s Great Hall of the People on July 11. Chinese President Xi Jinping will not attend the Group of 20 summit in India this week as bilateral relations remain frosty.
BEIJ>>ING (AP) — Chinese President Xi Jinping will not attend the Group of 20 summit in India this week because bilateral relations remain frigid.
Instead, Premier Li Qiang will represent China at the Sept. 9-10 meeting, the Foreign Ministry said Monday in a one-sentence statement posted on its website.
Relations between China and India are frosty because of their disputed border. Three years ago, tensions led to a clash in the Ladakh region that killed 20 Indian infantrymen and 4 Chinese infantrymen. This has become a long-standing stalemate in this rugged mountainous area. , where every aspect has stationed tens of thousands of troops subsidized with artillery, tanks and fighter jets.
Friction has also increased around the industry and India’s development of strategic ties with China’s main rival, the United States. India and China expelled their respective journalists.
India recently overtook China as the world’s most populous country and the two countries are rivals when it comes to technology, exploration and global trade.
Asked why Xi would attend the summit, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Mao Ning declined to answer.
“The G20 is a premier forum for foreign economic cooperation. China has attached wonderful importance and actively participated in relevant activities,” Mao told reporters at a daily press briefing.
“Premier Li Qiang will expand China’s perspectives and proposals on cooperation at the G20, inspire the G20 to solidarity and cooperation, and work together to tackle global economic and progress challenges,” he said.
Mao said China is willing to work with all parties “to jointly promote the good fortune of the G20 summit” and “make positive contributions to promote a sound recovery of the global economy and promote sustainable development. “
Chinese and Indian army commanders met last month and vowed to “maintain peace and quiet” on their disputed border, in a clear effort to stabilize the situation.
The Line of Royal Control separates territories under Chinese and Indian control from Ladakh in the west to the state of Arunachal Pradesh in eastern India, which China claims in its entirety. India and China fought over their border in 1962. As the call suggests, the line divides spaces of physical rather than territorial claims.
According to India, the de facto border is 3,488 kilometers (2,167 miles) long, but China proposes a significantly shorter figure.
In total, China claims some 90,000 kilometers (35,000 miles) of territory in northeastern India, adding Arunachal Pradesh with its predominantly Buddhist population.
India says China occupies 38,000 square kilometers (15,000 square miles) of its territory on the Aksai Chin plateau, which India considers part of Ladakh, where it is taking place recently.
Meanwhile, China has begun to cement relations with India’s rival Pakistan and with it on the disputed Kashmir issue.
Exchanges of fire broke out in 1967 and 1975, with deaths on both sides. Since then, they have followed protocols, adding an agreement banning the use of firearms, but those protocols have fragmented.
In addition to the possible effects on China-India relations, Xi’s absence from the summit will also affect the option of interaction with President Joe Biden. Relations remain at an all-time low despite recent visits by U. S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken and other officials to Beijing.
For days there had been much speculation about Xi’s attendance, and even before China’s official announcement, Biden told reporters on Sunday that he looked forward to a meeting with the Chinese leader.
“I’m disappointed, but I’m going to see it,” Biden said.
It is unclear exactly when such an assembly will take place, as there are now doubts about Xi’s participation in the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation leaders’ assembly to be held in San Francisco in November.
China has demanded that the United States invite Hong Kong Chief Executive John Lee to the forum despite a U. S. visa ban for his role in crushing the pro-democracy movement in the semi-autonomous southern Chinese city.
An article published Monday on the State Security Ministry’s social media accused the United States of sending combined signals to China as part of a strategy of “obstruction, containment and repression. “
The ministry’s message — China’s equivalent of the former Soviet Union’s KGB — condemns the United States for Taiwan’s self-rule, economic competition, U. S. defiance of Chinese claims to the South China Sea and allegations of human rights abuses in Tibet.
“To achieve, in fact, ‘from Bali to San Francisco,’ the United States will have to be honest enough,” the message said, referring to the last meeting between the two heads of state on the Indonesian island of Bali at the G20 Summit last November.
Xi has amassed more domestic strength than any Chinese leader since Mao Zedong and has adopted a competitive strategy toward what he sees as China’s territorial interests in the South China Sea and Taiwan’s self-rule, which China threatens to annex by force if necessary.
At the same time, China has struggled to recover economically from the harsh policies it has pursued in the face of COVID-19. Foreign corporations also complain of an increasingly complicated environment for making investments and trading with the country.
Xi will not be the only foreign head of state absent from the summit. Russian President Vladimir Putin, who faces war crimes charges following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, will also not attend the summit; it plans to stop at its close partner, China, next time. month.
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