Nepalese PM Oli raises India-China Lipulekh trade route issue with China’s Xi Jinping
Kathmandu (PTI): Nepalese Prime Minister K P Sharma Oli on Saturday raised an objection to an agreement reached between India and China to use Lipulekh as a trade route during a bilateral meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping in Tianjin, according to his secretariat.
Nepal claims Lipulekh as its own territory, a claim that India has categorically rejected as "neither justified nor based on historical facts and evidence."
"Prime Minister Oli, on the occasion, clearly raised its objection to the agreement reached between India and China to use Lipulekh, a Nepalese territory, as a trade route," the PM's secretariat said in a statement quoting Foreign Secretary Amrit Bahadur Rai.
“Nepal believes that China will cooperate with Nepal in this regard," the Prime Minister was quoted as saying in the statement.
The two leaders also agreed to strengthen bilateral ties and cooperation, it said.
"They also agreed to move forward the bilateral mechanism for enhancing bilateral relations and cooperation between the two countries," the statement added.
Oli reached Tianjin Saturday afternoon. He held a bilateral meeting with President Xi in the Guest House situated in Tianjin.
Prime Minister Oli is accompanied by his spouse Radhika Shakya, Minister for Science and Education Raghuji Panta, Minister for Tourism and Civil Aviation Badri Pandey and other high-level government officials. He is on an official visit to China to participate in the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) Summit 2025.
Let the Truth be known. If you read VB and like VB, please be a VB Supporter and Help us deliver the Truth to one and all.
Indigo flights chaos: SCR to run special trains to clear passenger rush
Hyderabad (PTI): The South Central Railway on Saturday announced that it would run four special trains to manage the surge in passengers resulting from the large-scale cancellation of IndiGo flights here.
The move comes as flyers face significant disruption and long queues at the airport due to the cancellation.
A press release from the SCR said it is running the special trains to clear the extra rush of passengers to Chennai, Mumbai and Shalimar (Kolkata) from Hyderabad today.
Meanwhile, as many as 43 outbound Indigo flights were cancelled from here on Saturday, Rajiv Gandhi International Airport sources said.
ALSO READ: IndiGo cancels over 200 flights from Delhi, Mumbai on Saturday
Similarly, 26 incoming flights are also likely to be cancelled during the day, they said.
The flight cancellations drew ire from passengers, who thronged the IndiGo counters at the airport demanding to know the exact situation.
“This is utter nonsense! Digiyatra done, message received that departure has been rescheduled ahead of the scheduled departure and now upon arriving at Hyderabad airport coming to know at the security checkpoint that Indigo flight is cancelled,” Tarun Singha, former Ministry of Defence spokesperson said in a post on X.
“But the thing is if you don’t shout they do nothing. Example at Hyderabad Airport, there was no staff no flight information for an hour. Then a fellow passenger started shouting on mic and an Indigo staff appeared finally,” a netizen said in a post.
On Friday, when IndiGo cancelled over 1,000 flights from across airports, its CEO Pieter Elbers apologised in a video message for the major inconvenience caused to passengers due to the disruptions.
In the one-way video communication, Elbers also said that the airline was expecting fewer than 1,000 flights on Saturday.
