India-China hotline coming soon: Krishna
India and China are all set to set up a hotline between the Prime Ministers of the two countries, in a bid to somewhat smoothen the troubled relationship between the two Asian giants.
The announcement was made by External Affairs Minister S M Krishna at a seminar on India-China Relations, attended by a senior leader of the Politburo of China’s Communist Party, Zhou Yongkan, here on Monday.
Krishna said that it was crucial for the two nations to consolidate and strengthen their political partnership and understanding.
?As rising powers, India and China are often projected to have a competitive relationship. In the final analysis, it is up to us to disprove such scenarios by concrete examples of cooperation,? he said.
?While we accept that there will be outstanding issues between two large countries, we have to address each other?s concerns and exhibit sensitivities on issues impinging each other?s security and well-being if we are to make our relationship forge ahead,? he added.
Echoing Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, Krishna said India and China?s ambitions could peacefully coexist but the outcome required ?strong political will, sustained engagement and a high degree of mutual sensitivity.?
Proposing a tighter bond between their governments and political parties, he said that the two countries need to work together ?to consolidate and strengthen our political partnership and understanding.?
?However, unless we address some of the issues of bilateral concern, our relationship will not attain its true potential for building our common future in this Asian century,? he said.
Krishna welcomed the Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao?s proposed visit to India before the end of the year and said, ?India and China must not just cooperate; they must be seen to be doing so by the rest of the world.?
The mister said that it was in the best interests of the world to improve the economic and infrastructural integration and security cooperation between the two countries which at present lags behind Europe and the Americas.
Krishna also expressed hope that China will relax restrictions and provide Indian companies a level playing field particularly in the pharmaceutical and IT sectors where they continue to face barriers which restrict market access.
He said that while both the countries? GDPs (Gross Domestic Product) and bilateral trade was growing at a fast pace their inter-dependence is still insufficient towards building substantive stakes in each other
