Modi to visit China for first time in 7 years

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi will visit China for the first time in over seven years, a government source said yesterday, in a further sign of a diplomatic thaw with Beijing as tensions with the United States rise.

Modi will go to China for a summit of the multilateral Shanghai Cooperation Organisation that begins on August 31, the government source, with direct knowledge of the matter, told Reuters. India's foreign ministry did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

His trip will come at a time when India's relationship with the US faces its most serious crisis in years after President Donald Trump imposed the highest tariffs among Asian peers on goods imported from India, and has threatened an unspecified further penalty for New Delhi's purchases of Russian oil.

Modi's visit to the Chinese city of Tianjin for the summit of SCO will be his first since June 2018. Subsequently, Sino-Indian ties deteriorated sharply after a military clash along their disputed Himalayan border in 2020.

Meanwhile, India's National Security Adviser Ajit Doval is in Russia on a scheduled visit and is expected to discuss India's purchases of Russian oil in the wake of Trump's pressure on India to stop buying Russian crude, according to another government source.