Narendra Modi Starts Trip to China With a Burst of Sightseeing
By CHRIS BUCKLEY and ELLEN BARRY

HONG KONG — Prime Minister Narendra Modi of India pressed President Xi Jinping of China on border disputes and a yawning trade deficit on Thursday, after Mr. Modi started a trip to Chinawith a burst of sightseeing intended to highlight the ancient ties between the two neighbors.

China and India have contended for decades over territory and, increasingly, influence across South Asia. But on his first visit to China as prime minister, Mr. Modi has also focused on attracting Chinese investment and consumers, and both governments have, for now, lowered the volume of their disagreements.

In the talks between Mr. Modi and Mr. Xi in Xi’an, a city in northwest China, “there was a lot of discussion on strengthening trust and increasing convergence,” the Indian foreign secretary, Subrahmanyam Jaishankar, told NDTV, an Indian news channel. But Mr. Modi also raised the festering boundary disputes and China’s plans to build a highway in a part of Kashmir that is administered by Pakistan but also claimed by India, Mr. Jaishankar said.

Despite the contentious issues discussed by Mr. Modi and Mr. Xi, Mr. Jaishankar said that “the atmosphere was very comfortable.”

Mr. Xi endorsed deeper economic ties, according to a report of his meeting with Mr. Modipublished by Xinhua, China’s main state-run news agency. China and India should “achieve a higher level of complementarily and mutuality between our two big economies and continue becoming twin engines of economic growth for the region and the world,” Mr. Xi told Mr. Modi, according to Xinhua.

Mr. Xi mentioned potential investment in Indian rail lines and industrial parks, two areas where the Chinese government has been eager to establish firmer footholds for Chinese companies.

Mr. Xi said that he and Mr. Modi “must strive together to enhance mutual trust between our two countries, keep disputes and problems under good control, and avoid upheavals in broader relations between our two countries,” Xinhua reported.

China claims more than 34,000 square miles of Arunachal Pradesh, an area almost as large as Indiana, in northeast India. And India maintains that China has illegally occupied nearly 15,000 square miles of northern Jammu and Kashmir, called the Aksai Chin region, which was at the heart of a brief border war in 1962.

Kiren Rijiju, India’s junior minister for home affairs and a native of Arunachal Pradesh, said India hoped to revive regular confidence-building meetings with China on the border issues, which were abandoned in recent years.

“We have historical baggage with us, and we don’t want to carry this baggage forever,” he said, noting that Mr. Modi had made progress toward setting aside other long-simmering border disputes.

“We have settled the dispute with Bangladesh,” he said in an interview in New Delhi. “We have almost settled with Myanmar. We don’t have issues with Nepal.

“The sooner we settle these boundary disputes, the better.”

When Mr. Xi visited India in September, his talks with Mr. Modi were interrupted by renewed military tensions after thousands of Indian troops mobilized in Kashmir, facing Chinese troops. India has also long been a rival of Pakistan, which turns to China for economic and political backing. Mr. Xi visited Pakistan in April, when the Chinese government and companies pledged to build power generation and other infrastructure projects worth $46 billion.

But Mr. Modi’s administration hopes that India can also draw on Chinese capital, investment and consumers to bolster economic growth, build faster railway lines and expand other infrastructure, and a set of agreements will be unveiled when Mr. Modi holds talks in Beijing on Friday. Last year, the value of trade between China and India grew to $70.6 billion, but the Indian deficit was nearly $38 billion, according to Chinese customs statistics.

After arriving on Thursday morning in the ancient city of Xi’an, Mr. Modi visited the Terracotta Army museum, where thousands of lifelike ceramic soldiers guard the mausoleum of Emperor Qin Shi Huang, who died more than 2,200 years ago. Trailed by photographers, Mr. Modi, in dark glasses, wandered among the rows of life-size soldiers without cracking a smile, tough-guy imagery that was met with delight from many of his admirers back home.

After that, Mr. Modi viewed the Daxingshan Buddhist temple, where, 13 centuries ago, monks from India translated scriptures into Chinese.

After their talks in Xi’an, Mr. Xi accompanied Mr. Modi to the Giant Wild Goose Pagoda, where a seventh-century monk stored Buddhist texts and other relics he had gathered after traveling to what is now India. Later in the day, Mr. Modi took part in an extravagant welcome ceremonyinspired by the pageantry of the Tang dynasty of more than 11 centuries ago, when Xi’an was a prosperous, cosmopolitan capital of the empire.

Analysts said the displays of cultural kinship reflected an important element in relations between India and China. Mr. Modi and Mr. Xi are charismatic, nationalist figures who cast themselves as custodians of national virtues rooted in the ancient past, and both have tried to use that bond with the past to project, and defend, their priorities.

Mr. Xi has taken up the imagery of an ancient Silk Road binding China to its neighbors, and Mr. Modi has promoted Project Mausam, a vision of trade ties across the Indian Ocean that draws on ancient maritime routes.

Mr. Modi’s cultural diplomacy has a “dual aspect,” said Tanvi Madan, a fellow at the Brookings Institution and director of its India Project.

“One is to actually establish another link,” Ms. Madan said, “but the other is to subtly point out that India is also an old civilization, and therefore not in any way inferior, and because it’s an old civilization as well, deserving of respect.”

莫迪：南亞互連願與中合作

中印兩個「十億人口」國家的元首，昨天在西安會面，大陸國家主席習近平專程以唐代古禮回禮相迎，並提出中印關係發展四點建議。上任總理後首訪中國的莫迪強調，中國是偉大鄰居，歡迎到印度投資，願與中國在南亞互連互通建設上合作。

莫迪一行昨天上午飛抵古都西安，首站前往秦始皇兵馬俑博物館參觀，館方讓莫迪下坑道、近距離觀看；莫迪除了好奇問「為何都是男的？」，也忍不住手癢，用手指輕觸修復區兵馬俑。

莫迪首站造訪習近平的故鄉陝西西安，因去年習訪印度時曾作客莫迪故鄉古吉拉突邦，昨天是中方回禮；莫迪下午與習近平簡短會談後，兩人先參觀大雁塔、互贈菩提樹苗，晚宴前中方更以唐代古禮相迎。

針對中印關係發展，習近平在會見時向莫迪提出四點建議，一要從戰略高度和兩國關係長遠發展角度看待和處理中印關係，雙方可就「一帶一路」、亞投行等合作倡議，以及印度的「向東行動」政策積極溝通，找準利益切合點，實現對接。

二要更加緊密地對接各自發展戰略，實現兩大經濟體在更高水平上互補互助；三要共同努力增進兩國互信，管控好分歧和問題，避免兩國關係大局受到干擾；四要鼓勵兩國各界加強交流，增進瞭解。

莫迪強調，印方是中國的鄰居，希望繼續加強與中國的經貿關係，歡迎中國加大對印度投資；印中兩國都向南亞有關國家提供幫助和支持，中方提出「一帶一路」倡議，印方同樣重視南亞地區互連互通建設。

大陸國務院總理李克強今上午在北京人民大會堂舉行歡迎儀式並會談，共同見證總金額一百億美元的中印合作協議簽署儀式。另一重要軟性活動是今天下午，李克強與莫迪在天壇出席一場太極與瑜伽的聯合活動。莫迪本人是瑜伽熱愛者，每天清晨起床後都要做一小時瑜伽。

中印兩國因邊界問題，政治互信長期不足，外界認為此行焦點在經貿與文化。北京大學南亞研究中心主任姜景奎認為，莫迪訪問西安有多層含義，西安是中印文化交匯地，玄奘曾在西安翻譯佛經，其次西安是古代絲綢之路的起點，具有深厚文化底蘊，而天壇瑜伽是第三張感情牌。

中國社會科學院南亞研究中心秘書長葉海林強調，中印兩國的合作協定不少，但落實情況不佳，主因在中資企業對印度法律與社會欠缺瞭解，且印度對中國投資多持懷疑態度，中印雙方還需相互調整、彼此適應。

原文參照：
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/05/15/world/asia/india-china-narendra-modi-xi-jinping-xian.html

紐約時報中文版翻譯：
http://cn.nytimes.com/south-asia/20150515/c15modi/zh-hant/

2015-05-15．聯合報．A16．兩岸．特派記者林克倫