Liu Jianchao, the new head of the International Liaison Department of the Communist Party of China, is arriving in Kathmandu on a four-day official visit to Nepal on July 10, political and diplomatic sources said.
A senior CPN-UML leader told the Post that Liu will land in Kathmandu on Sunday and will meet with top political leadership including President Bidya Devi Bhandari, Prime Minister Sher Bahadur Deuba, UML Chairman KP Sharma Oli, and Pushpa Kamal Dahal, chairman of the CPN (Maoist Center), among others, according to the sources.
He will lead officials from the Communist Party of China for the visit, the details of which are yet to be made public by the Chinese side.
Liu replaced Song Tao in the first week of June.
On June 23 and 24, Liu held virtual talks with Maoist Centre chair Dahal and UML chair Oli. On June 30, he held talks with Foreign Minister Narayan Khadka and discussed a wide range of issues including bilateral relations, according to a statement by the Communist Party of China Internal Liaison Office.
Liu’s visit comes at a time when Nepal’s communist parties are discussing a possible left alliance.
He will take up several aspects of Nepal-China ties in line with what he had discussed with Oli and Dahal in the third week of June, a UML leader said.
This article has been updated to fix the date of Jianchao's arrival. An earlier version misstated he is arriving on June 10.
Anil Giri is a reporter covering diplomacy, international relations and national politics for The Kathmandu Post. Giri has been working as a journalist for a decade-and-a-half, contributing to numerous national and international media outlets.
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