State-backed China Eastern Airlines will resume Shanghai-Delhi flights from November 9, the airline’s website shows, as China and India resume direct air links amid a diplomatic thaw, largely triggered by aggressive United States trade policies, after a five-year freeze.
The flights will operate three times a week on Wednesdays, Saturdays and Sundays, the airline’s online ticket sales platform showed on Saturday.
China Eastern Airlines did not immediately respond to the Reuters news agency’s emailed request for comment.
India’s foreign ministry said earlier this month that commercial flights between the two neighbouring countries would restart after a five-year freeze.
The announcement followed Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s first visit to China in more than seven years, for a summit meeting of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation regional security bloc. The two sides discussed ways to improve trade ties, while Modi raised concerns about India’s burgeoning bilateral trade deficit.
India and China’s foreign ministries did not immediately respond to requests for comment on the Shanghai-Delhi flights.
India’s largest carrier, IndiGo, previously announced it would start daily nonstop flights between Kolkata and Guangzhou.
State-backed Guangzhou Baiyun International Airport said at the time of the IndiGo announcement that it would encourage airlines to open more direct routes, such as between Guangzhou and Delhi.
Direct flights between the two countries were suspended during the COVID pandemic in 2020 and did not resume after deadly clashes along their Himalayan border led to a prolonged military stand-off later that year.
Four Chinese soldiers and 20 Indian soldiers were killed in the worst violence between the neighbours in decades.
India and China’s diplomatic thaw comes amid US President Donald Trump’s increasingly belligerent trade polices.
The US president raised the tariff rate on Indian imports to a stiff 50 percent in September, citing the nation’s continuing purchases of Russian oil.
He also urged the European Union to impose 100 percent tariffs on China and India, ostensibly as part of his efforts to pressure Moscow to end its war in Ukraine.
