China at crossroads, India aims to take pivot with G20 Summit
Bharat mandapam, G20 Summit venue
Manish Anand
New Delhi, September 6: Reports suggest that Chinese President Xi Jinping is pinned down on the home front amid the elders in the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) livid at him for the direction that the country has taken under his charge in the recent years. Xi is skipping the G20 Leaders’ Summit in New Delhi on account of mounting challenges on the home front amid real-estate imploding and the youth unemployment at a record high.
“There are signs of turmoil in Chinese domestic politics. This summer’s Beidaihe meeting, group of retired party elders like Zeng Qinghong, a former vice president, reprimanded the top leader in ways they had not until now,” Asia Nikkei said in a report on Wednesday.
Top Indian officials have also said that Xi’s skipping of the G20 Summit has nothing to do with issues concerning India. This is despite the fact that Xi’s expansionist foreign policy is credited to have worsened the bilateral relations between India and China with the soldiers of the two countries facing each other across the line of actual control in eastern Ladakh. China also came out with a 2023 map, showing Arunachal Pradesh as its own territory, which invited official Indian reprimand.
While Xi stays away from the G20 Summit, which India is projecting as a solution-oriented multilateral event, US President Joe Biden will be in New Delhi for four days to show his full commitment to support the Indian bid to zero in on actionable outcomes on a host of issues, including climate change, growing debt of the developing and poor countries, health equity, hunger, and clean energy transition. The national security advisor of the US, Jack Sullivan, has called upon China to be a party to the solutions for global issues, while hinting that attempts to derail the Summit in New Delhi would not be to the liking of the western nations.
Foreign Ministry officials are learnt to have briefed the Council of Ministers headed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on the G20 presidency of the country for which over 200 meetings across the country have been held so far. China and India are seen to be competitors to take the pivotal position as voice of the Global South (developing nations). With China mired in mounting challenges within the Communist nation, India with its robust economic growth is positioning itself as the credible voice of the Global South who can connect with the Global North (developed nations) for consensus approach in finding solutions for global challenges.
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