CHINA/INDIA: The Chinese Premier, Mr Zhu Rongji, arrived in India yesterday for the start of the first visit by a senior Chinese leader to the country in 10 years. He arrived in the tourist town of Agra, home to the Taj Mahal.
Mr Zhu has already publicly called on China's ally, Pakistan, to show "maximum restraint" and he is expected to deliver the same message to India during his six-day visit.
A Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman said President, Pervez Musharraf's pledge to crack down on Islamic militants showed Pakistan's willingness to settle a tense standoff with its arch-rival India through dialogue.
"This will be conducive to easing the tensions in the region," the spokesman said."President Musharraf's speech demonstrated Pakistan's determination to suppress religious extremist forces at home and stressed its willingness to solve the dispute with India through dialogue.".
Mr Zhu is expected to be questioned about reports of big Chinese arms shipments to Pakistan in recent weeks. China has supplied arms to Pakistan for years and, military analysts say, is believed to have supplied the know-how behind its nuclear arsenal.
Pakistan has denied a report in the country's biggest English-language newspaper, The News, that it received five shiploads of military hardware from China, including dozens of combat jets and a missile system. Analysts say the denial may be cosmetic.
China has also distanced itself from a statement by Gen Musharraf's press secretary quoting Beijing saying it would support Islamabad "in all eventualities".
Beijing's ties with Islamabad had long served as a strategic counterweight to the influence of India, now the only country besides China with more than a billion people.
But relations between India and China, which fought a border war in 1962, have warmed lately amid concern in Beijing that Muslim extremism in Pakistan could spill into China, which already faces its own Islamic militants.
Mr Zhu's visit is seen as an opportunity to grandstand with the US Secretary of State, Mr Colin Powell, and the British Prime Minister, Mr Tony Blair.