Xi Jinping pledges to stand by India

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Chinese President Xi Jinping held a bilateral meeting in the northern Chinese port city of Tianjin.

The Chinese President assured India of his support in the fight against terrorism.

In a statement on Sunday, India's Ministry of External Affairs said that Modi also discussed expanding bilateral trade, maintaining peace on the border and strengthening people-to-people contacts with the top leader of arch-rival China.

According to Indian Foreign Secretary Vikram Misri, Modi raised terrorism as a major topic of discussion in the meeting. He clearly stated that terrorism is a major threat to both India and China. China has supported India's call in this regard.

Earlier, India had refused to sign the joint declaration at the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) summit in June because it did not mention the Pahalgam attack. Instead, the declaration included the Balochistan attack, which indirectly indicates an accusation against India.

According to analysts, New Delhi and Beijing have started moving towards a new equation in relations after US President Donald Trump imposed a 50 percent tariff on Indian goods.

According to the Ministry of External Affairs, Prime Minister Modi emphasized in the meeting that India and China should maintain strategic autonomy and the relationship should not be evaluated from the perspective of any third country.

The statement also said that Modi and Xi Jinping emphasized the importance of the two countries taking the same position on regional and global issues.

Meanwhile, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif are scheduled to meet at the SCO summit on Monday. This is going to be the first face-to-face meeting between the prime ministers of the two countries after the Pahalgam attack and 'Operation Sindoor'.

Notably, Modi attended the SCO summit directly after three years. Although India hosted the summit in 2023, it was held online, and he did not attend the summit in Kazakhstan in 2024.