thaw — largely prompted by the United States’ aggressive trade policies — following a five-year freeze.

The flights will operate three times a week, on Wednesdays, Saturdays, and Sundays, the airline’s online ticketing platform showed on Saturday. China Eastern Airlines did not immediately respond to an emailed request for comment from the Reuters news agency. India’s foreign ministry said earlier this month that commercial flights between the two neighbouring countries would restart after a five-year hiatus.

The announcement followed Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s first visit to China in more than seven years, for a summit of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO), a regional security bloc. The two sides discussed ways to improve trade relations, while Modi raised concerns about India’s growing bilateral trade deficit.

Neither India’s nor China’s foreign ministries immediately responded to requests for comment regarding the Shanghai–Delhi flights. India’s largest carrier, IndiGo, had previously announced plans to begin daily nonstop flights between Kolkata and Guangzhou. At the time of that announcement, Guangzhou Baiyun International Airport — also state-backed — said it would encourage airlines to open additional direct routes, including between Guangzhou and Delhi.

Direct flights between the two countries were suspended during the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020 and did not resume after deadly clashes along their Himalayan border led to a prolonged military standoff later that year. Four Chinese soldiers and 20 Indian soldiers were killed in the worst violence between the neighbours in decades.

The recent diplomatic thaw between India and China comes amid US President Donald Trump’s increasingly confrontational trade policies. In September, the US president raised the tariff rate on Indian imports to 50 percent, citing the country’s continued 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. (Aljazeera)