00:00OK, well, let's talk a bit more about that Trump tempest and these new friends.
00:04So Presidents Xi and President Putin have been holding talks on the sidelines of that conference in China with your prime minister, Narendra Modi.
00:13And there are these concerns in Washington that this trade standoff is having the effect of drawing India closer to those two countries.
00:22And it sounds like you believe that is, in fact, partially the case.
00:26I think it's partially the case. I don't think either country would would actually be situated in that context.
00:32But for anyone looking at it, it's inescapable, the context, given the fact that the the fall that, as I mentioned, began late last year,
00:42had already slowed down because of the the stepping back as a result of the conflict with Pakistan,
00:49and which China offered real time military assistance to Pakistan, as well as diplomatic support in the Security Council and elsewhere.
00:58Given all of that, things were not exactly thawing the way they might have.
01:02And had Mr. Trump not done what he'd done, there would certainly have been a slightly more formal, slightly more distant approach.
01:09But I think right now, India understands, number one, that it needs China, as it needs many other countries.
01:16And China understands that this is not a bad time to be talking to India, because India is approaching it from a position of weakness,
01:23from, as we say in cricket, from being on the back foot.
01:26And I think that's something which gives each side an incentive to do some serious talking.
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