India and China are going through an “unprecedented” situation, External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar said on Thursday, referring to the prolonged border standoff between the two countries in eastern Ladakh.
Speaking at a virtual conference of the World Economic Forum, the external affairs minister, at the same time, said the border row happens to be one part of the larger issue of how India and China adjust to each other when both are rising.
Jaishankar said it is important for India and China to understand the need to accommodate each other’s rise. “We are going through, in a sense, an unprecedented situation. But if one looks at it from a somewhat longer-term, I would say this is one facet of a larger phenomenon for which both India and China have to sit down and find a solution.” Jaishankar said the challenge for the diplomacy of the two countries would be on how to adjust to each other’s rise. “It is important that they (India and China) understand the need to accommodate each other’s rise; clearly they will have some common interests and many interests which are more individual, nationally-centred and that process of how to adjust to each other when both of them are rising to my mind is one of the big issues in the diplomacy of both the countries,” he added. “The border issue happens to be one part of that problem,” Jaishankar said.