India and China have made “some progress” in disengagement, External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar said on Sunday, describing it as a “welcome” move which opens up the possibility that other steps could happen.His comment comes days after Indian and Chinese troops completed disengagement at two friction points at Demchok and Depsang Plains in eastern Ladakh. The Indian Army commenced verification patrolling at Depsang while patrolling at Demchok started on Friday.
“In terms of India and China, yes, we have made some progress. You know, our relations were very, very disturbed for reasons all of you know. We have made some progress in what we call disengagement, which is when troops were very close to each other, with the possibility that could lead to some untoward incident,” Jaishankar said while responding to a question during interaction with the Indian diaspora here.
“There are very large numbers of Chinese troops deployed along the Line of Actual Control who were not there before 2020. And we, in turn, have counter-deployed. There are other aspects of the relationship, which also got affected during this period. So clearly, we have to see after the disengagement, what is the direction we go. But we do think the disengagement is a welcome step. It opens up the possibility that other steps could happen,” said the minister.
He said that the expectation after Prime Minister Narendra Modi met Chinese President Xi Jinping in Russia last month was that “both the national security advisor and myself, we would meet our counterpart. So that’s where things are”.