India and China will discuss ways to hasten up disengagement at the Line of Actual Control (LAC) in Ladakh during External Affairs Minister Jaishankar and his Chinese counterpart Wang Yi’s talks in Tajikistan on Wednesday.

The bilateral parleys on the sidelines of the two-day  Shanghai Co-operation Organisation (SCO) in Dushanbe come at a time when a stalemate persists at three friction points at the LAC in Eastern Ladakh. The 11th round of Corps Commander-level talks in early April did not yield positive results.

At present, more than one lakh troops from both the sides are in an eyeball-to-eyeball confrontation at the three friction points including the Hot Springs, Gogra and the Depsang Valley.

The talks between the two Foreign Ministers may break the logjam leading to the 12th round of talks between the two commanders at the earliest.  Incidentally, the diplomatic- level talks in the last week of June between India and China resolved to hold the military- level talks as soon as possible, sources said here on Tuesday.

It will be the second face to face and one-on-one talks between Jaishankar and Wang Yi since the stand-offs started in early May last year at the LAC. The last time, the two leaders had met in Moscow in September last year during the Foreign Ministers’ meet of the SCO countries.

The SCO conclave will primarily discuss the worsening situation in Afghanistan and the Taliban controlling large part of that country.   Jaishankar will not hold bilateral talks with his Pakistani counterpart Shah Mehmood Qureshi on the sidelines of the conference. However, he will meet Foreign Ministers of other member countries including China, sources said.

The main focus of the talks with Wang Yi will be to find an amicable and mutually agreeable solution to disengage and de-escalate the tension at the LAC.

India has all along insisted that disengagement and de-escalation from the three friction points is the prerequisite for normalising ties with each other.

However, China is dilly dallying and not agreeing to sit for the 12th round of parleys. It wants the discussions to be held at the local commander level of the two nations. The Indian security establishment is wary of this proposal and is studying all options, sources said.

The two countries have so far pulled back their troops from only one standoff site at the Pangong Tso (lake). The troops from both the sides returned to their bases from the face-off sites at the northern and southern banks of the Pangong lake in February this year.