Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi will visit India next week - on August 18 - to hold talks with National Security Advisor Ajit Doval. The visit will take place shortly before Prime Minister Narendra Modi visits China - his first trip since clashes in Ladakh five years ago led to heightened military tension on the border - for the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation summit.
Also, Mr Yi's visit to India will take place against the backdrop of United States President Donald Trump hitting both Beijing and Delhi with massive tariffs. Mr Trump has slapped a 50 per cent tariff on India - including a 25 per cent 'penalty' for the purchase of Russian weapons and oil.
The last Yi-Doval meet was in June for an earlier sitting of the SCO, a regional security bloc.
India-China ties have thawed, ever so slightly. after Donald Trump's tariff attacks. The US and China were involved in a tit-for-tat exchange of import duties earlier this year, with Washington declaring a 145 per cent duty on Chinese imports and Beijing a 125 per cent jab on US goods.
In March - when US duties on China were still only 20 per cent - Mr Yi called on India and China to work together and "take the lead in opposing hegemonism and power politics".
Speaking after a National People's Congress meet, he said "making the dragon and elephant dance is the only right choice... supporting, instead of wearing each other down, and strengthening cooperation, instead of staying on guard, is in our fundamental interests."
He also pointed to "positive strides" in the India-China relationship over the past year, referring to military disengagement in Ladakh's Depsang and Demchok after the 2020 clashes.
Days later India acknowledged the outreach.
Foreign Minister S Jaishankar said the government is working to plot "a more predictable and positive course" for the relationship, measures for which would include resumption of pilgrimages to sites under China's control, direct flights, and exchange of journalists.
China, meanwhile, has welcomed Mr Modi's forthcoming visit, underscoring what seems to be a move, for now, towards closer ties with India. Foreign Ministry spokesperson Guo Jiakun said the SCO summit, to be held on August 31 and September 1 in Tianjin, would be the largest ever.
Mr Modi is likely to hold bilateral meetings with Russia's Vladimir Putin, with whom India is working to end the war in Ukraine, and Chinese President Xi Jinping on the sidelines.
