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lite.cnn.com - on gopher - inofficial
ARTICLE VIEW:
Xi and Modi talk friendship in a ‘chaotic’ world as Trump’s
tariffs bite
By Simone McCarthy, Nectar Gan, Rhea Mogul, CNN
Updated:
4:31 PM EDT, Sun August 31, 2025
Source: CNN
Chinese leader Xi Jinping told India’s Narendra Modi the “right
choice” is for their countries to be friends as the two met in China
for first time in seven years – a new milestone in a nascent
rapprochement between the world’s most populous nations accelerated
by shared frictions with the United States.
Xi and Modi’s highly-anticipated meeting Sunday, on the sidelines of
a regional summit in the eastern port city of Tianjin, comes as both
nations face stiff US tariffs under President Donald Trump’s global
trade war, as well as Western scrutiny over their relationships with
Russia as the war in Ukraine grinds on.
“The world today is swept by once-in-a-century transformations,” Xi
told Modi in opening remarks, as both leaders sat face-to-face flanked
by their officials. “The international situation is both fluid and
chaotic,” he added.
“It is the right choice for both sides to be friends who have good
neighborly and amicable ties, partners who enable each other’s
success, and to have the dragon and the elephant dance together,” Xi
said, referring to traditional symbols of the two nations.
“As long as they adhere to the overall direction of being partners
rather than rivals … China-India relations can maintain stability and
move forward over the long run,” he said.
Modi said India was “committed” to taking their countries’
relations forward “on the basis of mutual trust and respect,” and
referenced their bettering of ties, including an easing of tensions
along their disputed Himalayan border – where the two fought a deadly
skirmish in 2020.
“The interests of 2.8 billion people in both our countries are tied
to our cooperation,” he added.
The positive signals are sure to be closely watched in Washington,
where tensions with New Delhi threaten to derail what had been years of
efforts from US diplomats to deepen ties with the country as a key
counterweight to a rising and increasingly assertive China – a set of
circumstances that makes the latest meeting all the more important and
timely to Xi.
Trump earlier this month levied significant economic penalties on
India, initially placing its imports into the US under 25% tariffs and
then slapping an additional 25% duties on the country as punishment
for importing Russian oil and gas, which Washington sees as helping to
fund Putin’s war in Ukraine. Both China and India are major
purchasers of Russian oil, though China has yet to be targeted with
such measures.
Modi said he spoke with Ukrainian leader Volodymyr Zelensky Saturday
and “exchanged views on the ongoing conflict.” India has previously
said it does not take sides in the war.
In his daily address on Sunday, Zelensky said that “everyone in the
world has said that the fighting must be ceased,” including Turkey,
Azerbaijan and Kazakhstan, who he noted were in China for the summit.
“Almost everyone else in the world is also in favor of ending the
war,” he continued.
India’s oil purchases could be a point of discussion on Monday, when
Modi is expected to hold bilateral talks with Putin, part of his wider
diplomacy as he joins a two-day summit of the Beijing-and Moscow-backed
regional security grouping known as the (SCO).
In addition to China, Russia, and India, the group includes Iran,
Pakistan, Belarus, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan, as well as
partner and observer countries. Chinese officials ahead of the event
said leaders from more than 20 countries from across Asia and Middle
East would join the summit.
Xi hosted attending leaders for a welcome banquet on Sunday evening,
where he appeared to put his warm and relaxed rapport with Putin on
show. Footage released by Russia state news agency RIA showed the two
leaders gesturing animatedly and smiling as they chatted at the event,
showing a different side of the typically restrained Chinese leader.
The pair then walked shoulder to shoulder together after posing for a
photo alongside other gathered leaders, with Xi gesturing for Putin to
walk with him, footage released by the Kremlin showed.
The SCO is the two leaders’ first opportunity to meet in person since
Putin’s summit with Trump in Alaska earlier this month – part of
the US president’s push to end the war in Ukraine. Xi and Putin
“discussed the latest contacts” between the US and Russia during a
“detailed conversation,” Russian state media reported Sunday,
citing Kremlin aide Yury Ushakov.
Putin’s war looms over the SCO gathering and the flurry of diplomacy
around it, with the Russian president, who landed in Tianjin earlier
Sunday, joining the gathering as Western leaders ramp up pressure on
him– and his partners – to end the now more than
three-and-half-year invasion.
A warming relationship?
Beijing is widely seen as eager for the newfound tensions between Trump
and Modi to reduce what have been burgeoning security ties between the
US and India. Chinese officials have watched with unease the elevation
of the Quad security dialogue between India, the US and its allies
Australia and Japan, widely seen as a bid to counter China.
In his remarks to Modi on Sunday, Xi sought to stress commonalities –
framing the two countries as at “critical stages of development and
rejuvenation,” and calling for them to “focus on development as
their greatest common denominator, supporting and advancing each
other,” according to a readout from China’s Foreign Ministry.
He also referenced their shared stated aim to make the international
order more “multipolar” – a term used by countries, including
those within the SCO, to call for international power to be more
broadly shared – as opposed to dominated by the US and its allies, as
they see it.
There has been a gradual normalization of ties between India and China
after Modi and Xi met on the sidelines of the BRICS summit in Russia
last October, which came as the two sides reached an agreement on
military disengagement along their disputed border.
In recent months, the countries agreed to restart direct flights
cancelled since the Covid-19 pandemic. Beijing also recently agreed to
reopen two pilgrimage sites in western Tibet to Indians for the first
time in five years, and both started re-issuing tourist visas for each
other’s citizens.
Earlier this month, following a visit from China’s top diplomat Wang
Yi to New Delhi, the two announced “ten points of consensus” on the
issue to further reduce tensions.
Xi and Modi on Sunday also discussed what’s “happening on the
international plain and the challenges it creates,” India Foreign
Secretary Vikram Misri told reporters on the SCO sidelines, when asked
about whether Trump’s tariffs were raised.
“They tried to, in a sense, see how to leverage that for building
greater understanding between themselves, and how to … take forward
the economic and commercial relationship between India and China in the
midst of these evolving challenges,” Misri said.
Observers say, however, that even as the two leaders seek stability in
their relationship, both in terms of trade and security, it will be
hard for Xi and Modi to overcome a longstanding lack of personal trust.
Underlying tensions between India and China spiked in 2020 following a
deadly conflict along their disputed Himalayan border, in which 20
Indian and four Chinese soldiers were killed in hand-to-hand combat.
The two nations maintain a heavy military presence along their
2,100-mile (3,379-kilometer) de facto border, known as the Line of
Actual Control (LAC) – a boundary that remains undefined and has been
a persistent source of friction since their bloody 1962 war.
But both leaders on Sunday appeared keen to signal the welcome of a
warmer chapter.
An Indian readout released following the meeting said they reaffirmed
that “their differences should not turn into disputes” and their
“stable relationship and cooperation” was necessary for the
“growth and development of the two countries, as well as for a
multipolar world.”
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