India, China to resume military exercise suspended after Doklam

TIL Desk/World/Beijing/ Suspended after the Doklam face-off, the bilateral military exercise of India and China is likely to resume this year, in sync with renewed efforts by both the countries to reset ties hit by a tense standoff between their troops, government sources said on Wednesday.

The exercise ‘Hand-in-Hand’ between the armies of the two countries will take place within next 4-5 months in China and an announcement is likely to be made very soon, sources told.

It is learnt that the issue of resumption of the annual exercise had figured during talks between Defence Minister Nirmala Sitharaman and her Chinese counterpart General Wei Fenghe in Beijing on Tuesday. Sitharaman was in Beijing to attend a meeting of defence ministers of SCO (Shanghai Cooperation Organisation) countries.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi is travelling to Chinese city of Wuhan on Friday on a two-day visit to hold an ‘informal summit’ with Chinese President Xi Jinping, seen as an effort to build mutual trust between the two sides.

Chinese Vice Foreign Minister Kong Xuanyou said the two leaders will try to reach important consensus to resolve outstanding issues and build mutual trust during their talks in Wuhan.