BEIJING, Jan 13: Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh arrived here Sunday for talks with China’s leaders as the two most populous nations look to turn their combined clout into a major force in global affairs.

It is the first visit by an Indian premier in five years as the Asian powerhouses, who account for one-third of the world’s people, try to set aside lingering disputes and establish a partnership on the international stage.

“India-China relations have today transcended their bilateral dimension and have acquired global and strategic significance,” Singh told China’s state Xinhua news agency in an interview ahead of the trip.

He said he hoped to discuss a wide range of issues with Chinese leaders including UN reforms, regional dialogue and global issues such as climate change, energy security, international trade and counter-terrorism.

Singh was to visit Olympic venues on Sunday as part of the three-day trip before holding talks with his counterpart Wen Jiabao and President Hu Jintao on Monday and Tuesday, a Chinese official said.

Along with Singh, India is sending Commerce Minister Kamal Nath at the head of a trade delegation, with New Delhi looking to rein in a trade gap with China that it says has jumped from four billion to nine billion dollars since 2006.

“We would like to sell much more to China,” Indian Foreign Secretary Shiv Shankar Menon told journalists before the group left New Delhi. “In the last few years, trade shifted in China’s favour, and we are hoping to change that,” he said.

Officials said the two sides would also work on a long-standing territory dispute which led to a brief war in 1962.

In his interview, Singh said that settlement of the boundary would “advance the basic interests of the two countries and should therefore be pursued as a strategic objective”. India says China occupies 38,000 square kilometres of its territory, while Beijing claims the whole of Arunachal Pradesh.—AFP