By IANS,
New Delhi : Amid reports of ULFA leader Paresh Baruah sheltering in China, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh is expected to take up the issue of northeastern insurgents when he meets Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao on the sidelines of the East Asia summit in Bali Friday.
Manmohan Singh heads on a two-nation tour, including Indonesia, the host of the ASEAN and the East Asia Summit, and Singapore, Thursday.
“The presence of Indian insurgent groups and the availability of arms for them in the region has figured in discussions with our Chinese friends,” Vishnu Prakash, spokesperson of the external affairs ministry, told reporters here.
“We have also seen the reports. We don’t have credible information yet at our disposal,” he said when asked about some media reports that said Baruah, the leader of the banned United Liberation Front of Asom (ULFA), is hiding in Yunnan province in China.
According to some reports, Baruah has been sheltering in Ruili in China’s Yunnan province along with some cadres of northeastern insurgency groups. The Chinese border town is famous for its jade trade.
Manmohan Singh and Wen will meet in Bali Friday for talks on the margins of the 18-nation East Asia Summit, their first bilateral talks since the Chinese premier visited New Delhi in last December.
They will discuss entire gamut of bilateral issues, including the forthcoming boundary talks between their special representatives in New Delhi November-end.
Also on the table will be issues relating to trade and investment that have steadily gone up despite political differences over a host of issues, including the boundary dispute, stapled visas for residents of Jammu and Kashmir and India’s oil deals with Vietnam in the disputed South China Sea.