President Xi Jinping is not coming to India to attend this week’s Group of 20 or G20 Summit and instead sending his Premier Li Qiang to represent China at the September 9-10 event to be held in Delhi.
While Chinese foreign ministry spokesperson Mao Ning declined to answer the reason behind Xi Jinping's decision to skip the G20 meeting, it's out in the open that relations between China and India have grown frosty over their disputed border. (Follow G20 Summit LIVE updates)
5 probable reasons why Xi Jinping is not attending G20 Summit
1. Beijing recently released a so-called “standard map” laying territorial claim over Arunachal Pradesh, Aksai Chin as well as Taiwan and the South China Sea, Alipov attempted to play it down. China releases the standard map every year but it is the first time that India has lodged a strong protest over the map issues, rejecting the claims of the Communist nation. The timing of the map release was a little surprising since it came just a few days ahead of the G20 Summit. At the recently concluded BRICS Summit in Johannesburg, Prime Minister Narendra Modi held a brief interaction with Xi wherein he had expressed grave concern over the situation along the Line of Actual Control.
2. Relations between China and India have grown frosty over their disputed border. Three years ago, the tensions resulted in a clash in the Ladakh region that killed 20 Indian soldiers. It turned into a long-running standoff in the rugged mountainous area, where each side has stationed tens of thousands of military personnel backed by artillery, tanks and fighter jets.
3. Frictions have also risen over trade and India's growing strategic ties with China's main rival, the United States. Both India and China have expelled the other's journalists.
4. Wen-Ti Sung, political scientist at the Australian National University, told news agency Reuters that, "Xi's skipping the West-heavy club of G20 right after attending the BRICS summit may be a visual illustration of Xi's narrative of 'East is rising, and the West is falling', as well as showing solidarity with Russia's President Putin who is also not attending."
5. Alfred Wu, associate professor at the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy at the National University of Singapore, said Xi might be reluctant to travel abroad, given his focus on domestic issues. "Xi Jinping is setting his own agenda where his top concern is national security and he has to stay in China and make foreign leaders visit him instead," Wu said.
