It is up to Beijing to hold a Russia-India-China summit, says Moscow
Categories: FOREIGN COUNTRIES
Moscow has said that it is up to Beijing to hold the next Russia-India-China summit in accordance with Latin alphabetical order.In response to a question from WION, Russian foreign ministry spokesperson Maria Zakharova, in a weekly presser by the foreign ministry, said, "Today the initiative of holding the RIC summit is up to China, and we are ready to comprehensively support dialogue in this format." After a gap of 12 years, Russia organised the RIC summit on the sidelines of the G20 summit in Argentina in November 2018. It was followed by India holding a RIC summit on the sidelines of the Osaka G20 summit in 2019. Since then, no summit has been possible due to the COVID crisis, and the next turn is for China to hold the summit.The first Informal Summit of RIC Leaders was held on the sidelines of the G-8 Summit in St. Petersburg (Russia) in July 2006. Regular RIC foreign ministerial meetings have been organized, with the last one being hosted virtually by India in November of 2021. The big question remains, with aggressive Chinese action in the region, particularly with India, where the summit will take place. In 2020, due to aggressive actions by China at the line of actual control, India lost 20 of its soldiers in the Galwan area. According to official estimates, China lost 4 of its soldiers, but doubt remains on these figures, with Russian media quoting figures of more than 40.