'Obvious provocation’: China accuses India of using visa restrictions to prevent media contacts

China has said that India is using visa restrictions as a tool to prevent media contacts between the two nations. China’s comments came in an op-ed in state mouthpiece, The Global Times, that quoted a Wall Street Journal report that said that India and China have kicked out a large number of each other’s journalists by denying visa renewals. 

China Foreign Ministry Mao Ning alleged that Chinese journalists have suffered unfair and discriminatory treatment in India “for a long time”. It said that in 2017, India shortened the period of validity of visas held by Chinese journalists to three months or even one month with no valid reason. India refused to review and approve Chinese journalists’ applications for stationing in India and is yet to renew the visa of the last Chinese journalist in the country.

It called this an “obvious provocation” and said that India has repeatedly denied visas to Chinese journalists for no reason but accused China of ‘freezing’ visas for Indian journalists. 

The op-ed said restricting access to journalists is not conducive to India’s interests or to China-India relations. 

The op-ed stated that both the countries have been getting to know each other through the Western media, which are biased and distorted, and only damages India-China relations. It said that it is far easier to dispatch journalists to understand each other in a direct manner. 

In an earlier op-ed, the news site had urged India to be vigilant about the West’s exploitation. It had said that the West is concocting a ‘dragon-elephant rivalry’ and engaging in “sinister psychological manipulation”. The West is repeatedly flattering India to drive a wedge between the two countries. 

The latest Global Times op-ed further added that conflicts between the two nations such as border issues “can be put aside for the time being” to promote friendly and cooperative relations in other areas such as people-to-people exchanges and media relations. Restricting journalists will only increase misunderstandings that will eventually imperil India-China relations. 

The relationship between the countries dipped to its lowest following the deadly clash in Galwan Valley in Eastern Ladakh in June 2020. India has maintained that the relationship cannot be repaired unless there is peace in the border area.

When Congress leader Rahul Gandhi, who is in the US for a three-city US tour and addressed Indian students at the Stanford University Campus in California, was asked about India-China relationship in the next 5-10 years, he said, "It's tough right now. I mean, they've occupied some of our territory. It's rough. It's not too easy. India cannot be pushed around. That something is not going to happen."

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