As I noted yesterday, Indian and Chinese diplomats have been working to avert a potential flashpoint between the two giant Asian neighbors over two detained Indian businessmen. And, after some fevered negotiations, it seems like they’ve managed it.
The two Indians, Deepak Raheja and Shyamsundar Agrawal, were reportedly being held hostage by Chinese traders in the city of Yiwu after the owner of the company they worked for, a Yemeni national, apparently fled after failing to clear his debt to the Chinese traders. The traders had been insisting that Raheja and Agrawal must pay the money as they finalized the transactions. When the Indian traders refused they were reportedly forced to drink their own urine.
The incident risked sparking a diplomatic row between the two countries, with one of the captive businessmen raising the stakes by apparently promising to commit suicide if the Indian government didn’t step in and evacuate them to Shanghai within 24 hours.
Under pressure from Indian diplomats, the Chinese shifted gear under. Chinese envoy Zhang Yan met Indian External Affairs Minister S.M. Krishna on Wednesday and offered assurances over the safety of the two Indian businessmen. Zhang also met Joint Secretary (East Asia) Gautam Bambawale, who is said to have been instrumental in resolving the issue and securing the release of the two businessmen.
“I’m very happy with the outcome. The Traders have been released and they are on their way to Shanghai under consular officers’ security,” Krishna said. “We have friendly relations with China. Let’s not blow this incident out of proportion.”
“Both the traders will take care of themselves in the civil-suit case in China,” Krishna added at a late night press conference in New Delhi.
Zhang added: “We are coordinating. We are working hard to solve the issue. Everything will be settled through Chinese law.”
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yang zi
China didn’t shift any gears, it was a civil matter and these dead beats and the weak drama queen diplomat just can’t handle the heat. if you cheat, you will face the heat.
I also want to reiterate to a commentator called Neil, he is a monkey. because he is a racist.
Jenga
“… it was a civil matter and these dead beats and the weak drama queen diplomat just can’t handle the heat. if you cheat, you will face the heat.”
It ceased to be a civil matter the moment that the two were held against their will by private traders. Forcing them to drink urine pushes it well into criminal territory by almost any country’s definition.
yang zi
Drinking urine is not a fact established yet, it is highly likely just something made up either by the dead beats or the india rumor mill press. India has plenty of monkeys like the commenter Neil anyway. You can’t trust these racist bigots.
Girish
@yang zi
You are having difficulty in understanding simple things. Incase there is any fraud, traders must have approached the police rather then kidnapping those Indians and kept them under captivity and try to negotiate for their release.
Boris
” The traders had been insisting that Raheja and Agrawal must pay the money as they finalized the transactions. ” This is something remind me how smart these two Indians?
The company already bankrupted, fuel the bank account of the bankrupted company will sure benefit them as employees are the first to get paid during liquidation, and these Chinese Supplier will be the last on the list, which normally mean they will not get penny back. I don’t know how many times these regulations has been used as last minute trap by these smart employees.
I don’t think the behavior of Chinese traders are correct, but neither are these employees look innocent as they claimed and should be praised for their smartness.
Thomas
Indians love to drink urine…Cow urine is the national drink! You do the crime, you must do the time! Indians are the most untrustworthy business people on this world. Just look at their CWG’s to see how the love to overpromise and then underdeliver!
yang zi
you can’t trust what these dead beats say. I dont know the whole story, but my guess is these dead beats fell into a trap set up by the trader they traded. To educate Neil the monkey, I will be patient.
Here is the timeline,
1. Dead beats setup a company in a third country,
2. Dead beats cheat trader A,
3. Trader A, can’t find dead beats
4. Trader A told his friends and fellow traders to watch out for dead beats
5. Dead beats try to cheat trader B
6. Trader B told Trader A and they caught the dead beats on the spot.
7. Trader A, B treated dead beats as humane as possible, because these dead beats come from the land of drama queens
8. The Ministry of External Affairs send the drama queen diplomat,
9. The drama queen diplomat started to act, causing confusion and chaos
10. The dead beats and the diplomat started monkey dance while shouting
11. The diplomat dramatically fainted to conclude the drama
12. Indian rumor mills started to play a new drama, brought out the urine as the climax.
13. Urine excited monkeys like Neil, they started a collective monkey dance while chanting the ancient monkey songs
14. Thank god India has some humans left and took charge,
15. Humans on both side setup a roadmap to resolve the issue.
Lessons learned,
1. Bring banana while dealing with drama queens, in case they faint.
2. Ignore monkeys, talk with humans
11.
yang zi
I am officially calling this incident the Monkey Gone Wild Incident.
I did some readying, it turned out the drama queen diplomat is violating Chinese law. he visited these two dead beats in court, then claim they need to go to bathroom. when in fact, they tried to escape (claiming to Shanghai, but in fact to leave China). so naturally they were stopped by traders waiting outside the court room building. and then this drama queen started his monkey business, sitting on the floor and started behave like a spoiled child, while claiming he is diabetic and need medicine.
what a shame. India’s diplomat has such fishy characteristics. it is simply a cowardly and slimy monkey act.
An upstanding Indian diplomat should respectfully ask the court to send these dead beats to ShangHai, if refused, use whatever legal and diplomatic channel to resolve it. Instead, the diplomat act like a thief, pretending to go to bathroom, and try to sneak out.
India should gave up diplomatic immunity on this guy, let him face the Chinese law.
These dead beats owe a couple million dollars! they promised to pay early on, but later decided to flee.
Chinese authority should issue arrest warrant to these dead beats, charge that drama queen diplomat with helping them escape.
Sravan
Indian traders were working for a Qatari owner who cheated the locals. Regardless Chinese law should have come into account before the kidnapping, how can the mafia take law to their hands?? ( when a similar incident happened to Chinese builders in Korba which killed 47 people, Indian officails ensured they had a fair trail and even allowed em to visit China during trail! That is Indian behaviour just dont resort to name calling yang zi). What raised outrage in Indian media was the treatment of Indian diplomat who even after declaring a diabetic, was refused to basic facilities was caused him to faint, this is when things heated up, as a diplomat was also treated with no respect and this is also against the Vienna convention 1964. Yang zi you have stated that you donot know about the incident so please kindly refrain from name calling and the Indian media escalated the issue only after mishandling of Indian diplomat (and the news channels that highlighted this issue were nowt exactly mainstream)
yang zi
I guess that Qatar owner is an Indian. Also, why do you still believe Indian press? Its track record is a lying record.
Sravan
There are apporixaimately 600-700 news media in India, time has taught me what to believe, but most people were only enraged because of passive response when a diplomat was involved. We in India believe in “Athithi devo bhava” translated to a guest is like God and this leads to similar expectations when we are guests too, while many wish Indo-China relations to stabilize, for Indians this incident showed second hand treatment and Beijing has not shown serious commitment to change this.
yang zi
I am name calling because some of your fellow Indians are racist.
The diplomat was not mistreated, he tried to help the accused to escape, by lying to go to bathroom. If he is diabetic, he can return to court room ask the authorities. if he is any professional, he should not sneak out.
So what the Chinese traders supposed to do? Let the diplomat pass through with two dead beats? These two dead beats are not salary earners, they are profit sharers and members of a cheating group.
This thing causes uproar in India, only reflect how bad Indian diplomat and india press is.
JohnX
Yang Zi wrote: “I am name calling because some of your fellow Indians are racist.”
Two wrongs dont make a right Yang zi.
Some of your ‘fellow Chinese’ are racist too. So does that mean ?
yang zi
JohnX, in this case it does. You need to insult back to those who are insulting you, let them know how does it feel.
Boris
@Sravan,
Trust me, this is only story drafted by Indian media with zero knowledge about Chinese court system, because the diplomat is not defendant,lawyer and not relatives of defendant as well, he is free to move in Chinese court, even no need permission from the Judge, normally he will be viewed as bystander in the court.He may need permission to enter the courtroom, not leave.
Say the court deny his request is totally impossible.
JohnX
Interesting. A Russian name and an indepth understanding of Chinese court rules.
Yang zi
What we learned from this wild incident is that Indian businessmen are cheaters, Indian press are liers, Indian foriegn ministry is juvenile, indians are racist.
Way to go India, what can you expect from such a country ?
Boris
@JohnX,
Haha, what I said is common sense, I don’t think it’s really indepth knowledge of Chinese court rule, it’s something like “sky is always blue”, but I don’t know why Indian media want to propose “sky is not blue” story.
Make a better story, say Chinese court deny request of Indian consular to visit these two Indian defendant, this sounds logic, this is something related to visiting right of consular.
Shukla
@yang zi
You arte obviously a paid CPC Member whose job is to troll on each and every article that is published on diplomat…