Don’t want Maldives to be another flashpoint, in talks with India: China

TIL Desk/World/Beijing/ China on Friday said it is in touch with India to discuss a way to resolve the political turmoil gripping the Maldives and underlined that Beijing doesn’t want the issue to become another ‘flashpoint’.

While China officially continues to maintain that there should not be any external interference especially in the light of reports of India’s special forces ready for deployment, Beijing is also in touch with New Delhi to resolve the crisis, Chinese official sources said.

China doesn’t want Maldives to become another ‘flashpoint’, the sources told in Beijing on Friday. The stand-off between India and China in the Doklam area and Beijing’s opposition to declaring Pakistan-based Masood Azhar as a global terrorist at the UN had been major irritants in bilateral ties in the past.

Answering a spate of questions on the Maldives, including Friday’s telephonic conversation between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and US President Donald Trump, in which the situation in the Maldives figured prominently, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Geng Shuang said international community should respect sovereignty and independence of the Maldives.