India, China to resume Kailash Mansarovar Yatra, restart direct air services

Decision comes as two sides agree to take certain people-centric steps to "stabilise and rebuild" ties

New Delhi: India and China on Monday decided to resume the Kailash Mansarovar Yatra as the two sides agreed to take certain people-centric steps to “stabilise and rebuild” ties.

The Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) said this following Foreign Secretary Vikram Misri‘s talks with his Chinese counterpart Sun Weidong in Beijing.

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It said the two sides also agreed in principle to resume direct air services between the two countries.

“As agreed between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and President Xi Jinping at their meeting in Kazan in October, the two sides reviewed the state of India-China bilateral relations comprehensively and agreed to take certain people-centric steps to stabilize and rebuild ties,” the MEA said.

“In this context, the two sides decided to resume the Kailash Mansarovar Yatra in the summer of 2025,” it said.

The MEA said the two sides also agreed to hold an early meeting of the India-China expert level mechanism to discuss resumption of provision of hydrological data and other cooperation pertaining to trans-border rivers.

It said the two sides agreed to take appropriate measures to further promote and facilitate people-to-people exchanges, including media and think-tank interactions.

“They agreed in principle to resume direct air services between the two countries; the relevant technical authorities on the two sides will meet and negotiate an updated framework for this purpose at an early date,” the MEA said.