The meeting between PM Narendra Modi and Xi Jinping is being seen as a huge effort at rapprochement
No note-takers, no aides, no officials. That sums up the two-day "informal summit" meeting that will take place between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and China's President Xi Jinping this week in the Chinese city of Wuhan. This type of informal setting is a first for Mr Modi; but last year, Mr Xi held an informal meet with Donald Trump at the US president's glitzy Florida estate, Mar-a-Lago.
The format for Mr Modi and President Xi breaks away from the stiff, formal protocol that is usually the norm of such bilateral meetings. Sources say that editing down the protocol makes it easier for the two leaders to have a freewheeling, frank conversation, without being bogged down by "outcomes" and agreements. So the only people in the room will be the two leaders and their interpreters. And because there is no structure, no one really knows what to expect.
The meeting is being seen as a huge effort at rapprochement - India has described it as a "reset"- after tension between the neighbours flamed to its highest in decades over a military standoff at the border in Arunachal Pradesh. India stopped Chinese soldiers from building a new road that would give it access to a strategically-key sliver of land that connects mainland India to the north-eastern states.The dispute was declared resolved nearly 70 days after it began with both governments offering vague explanations for what was agreed to.
Summit meetings are usually accompanied by pomp, ceremony and a very structured format. So a visiting leader starts with a ceremonial welcome. There are three types of meetings that take place: a one-on-one, which is just the two leaders and their interpretors, as is the case in the informal summit in China; then there are "restricted talks" which include senior officials like the National Security Advisor, the Foreign Secretary, the Ambassador and sometimes a Joint Secretary. The third category is "delegation level" which involves a number of officials from both sides.Officials normally spend days ahead of a summit meeting preparing agreements, a joint statement, making last minute changes to reflect language that is acceptable to both sides, etc.
None of this will apply in the central Chinese city of Wuhan. No agreements, no pacts. Not even a list of subjects to discuss. Sources say the irritants in the relationship are unlikely to be discussed, this time the focus is on the positive. And because there is no structure, we really don't know what to expect. Will the two leaders stay closeted in a resort? Will they decide to eat out at a nice restaurant? No one knows, there is no protocol, and they can pretty much do as they please. More importantly, will this relaxed format bring a significant change in this much troubled relationship? That's a tougher question to answer.
After this trip, PM Modi will visit China again in June for a session of the the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation, a secrity bloc led by China and Russia which India joined last year.Two visits so close to each other to the same country are unusual for the PM.