India announced on Sunday that Prime Minister Narendra Modi will attend a regional meeting in Uzbekistan, where, according to Russia, President Vladimir Putin and Chinese President Xi Jinping will hold face-to-face negotiations.
On September 15 and 16, Samarkand will host the meeting of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, which consists of China, Russia, four Central Asian nations (Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan, and Tajikistan), India, and Pakistan.
Putin and Xi will meet at the summit, according to the Russian envoy to China, who made the announcement on Wednesday. This will be the Chinese president's first journey outside of the country since the beginning of the coronavirus outbreak.
The meeting was not immediately confirmed by Beijing's foreign ministry, whose spokesperson said during a routine press conference that "there is no information to share" on the subject.
It was not specified in the statement released by the Indian government on Sunday whether Modi would meet privately with Putin, Xi, or Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif.
India, like China, buys the majority of its weapons from Russia and has increased its imports of Russian oil while refusing to denounce Moscow's invasion of Ukraine.
Since violence on their disputed Himalayan border in 2020, which claimed at least 20 Indian and four Chinese soldiers' lives, India's relations with China have been tense. Since 2019, Modi and Xi have not had bilateral discussions.
Along with the United States, Japan, and Australia, India is a member of the so-called Quad, an alliance that is thought to be a defence against China.
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