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NEW DELHI: Indian and Chinese officials on Monday began fresh talks on sensitive border issues after discussions last year were cancelled over a speech in India by Tibetan spiritual leader the Dalai Lama.
Shiv Shankar Menon, India's national security adviser, and Chinese State Councillor Dai Bingguo led the two delegations at the meeting in New Delhi, the Indian foreign ministry said in a statement.
The 15th round of the cross-border talks will last two days, and cover the range of long-standing territorial disputes and other issues, officials said.
“While working hard to develop itself, China is fully committed to developing long-term friendship and cooperation with India,” Dai wrote in The Hindu newspaper on Monday.
“There does not exist such a thing as China's attempt to 'attack India' or 'suppress India's development',” he said.
The 2,000-kilometre border between India and China has been the subject of talks since the 1980s after the two nations fought a brief but brutal war in 1962.
Talks were cancelled in November after reports that Beijing objected to a scheduled speech in New Delhi by the Dalai Lama, who China's Communist government labels a separatist.
The Dalai Lama fled to India in 1959 after a failed uprising against Chinese rule. He later founded the government in exile in the northern Indian town Dharamshala after being offered refuge.
Chinese infrastructure build-up along the border has become a major source of concern for India, which increasingly sees China as a longer-term threat to its security than traditional rival Pakistan.
