China Claims Mediation Role in India-Pakistan Conflict; India Rejects Claim

China has claimed it mediated the May 2025 military conflict between India and Pakistan, an assertion New Delhi firmly rejects. Beijing presented its role as part of its objective diplomacy in resolving global hotspots.

China has asserted that it mediated between India and Pakistan during their May 2025 military conflict, adding its claims to those previously made by US President Donald Trump - both of which New Delhi has firmly rebuffed. Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi listed “tensions between India and Pakistan” among a series of global hotspots Beijing says it helped resolve this year, including conflicts in northern Myanmar, the Middle East and Southeast Asia.

Speaking at a symposium in Beijing on international affairs, Wang described China’s diplomatic approach as “objective and just,” suggesting that Beijing’s involvement aimed at addressing both immediate flare-ups and deeper root causes of conflict. In outlining this foreign policy posture, he said China had “mediated” the India-Pakistan situation alongside other disputes.

However, India has consistently rejected any suggestion of third-party mediation in the breakdown and subsequent cessation of hostilities between the two nuclear-armed neighbours. New Delhi maintains that the confrontation - triggered on May 7 by a terror attack in Pahalgam, which India attributed to Pakistan-based groups and to which it responded with Operation Sindoor - was ended through direct bilateral military communication.

Officials cite a May 10 phone call between the Directors General of Military Operations (DGMOs) of the Indian and Pakistani armies as the mechanism through which both sides agreed to halt military action.

These competing narratives follow earlier controversy stemming from then-US President Donald Trump’s repeated claims that Washington had brokered a “full and immediate” ceasefire between Delhi and Islamabad. India’s leadership rejected Trump’s version, asserting that no external power facilitated the truce and reinforcing its long-standing policy against third-party involvement in India-Pakistan bilateral issues.

Beijing’s claims come at a sensitive time in South Asian geopolitics. India has expressed wariness over Chinese influence in the region, especially given China’s deep strategic and military ties with Pakistan, including defence cooperation. The assertion of a mediating role - especially when New Delhi insists the conflict’s resolution was entirely bilateral - introduces a fresh point of diplomatic friction between the two Asian powers.

As India maintains its stance of no third-party intervention, China’s public positioning underscores broader strategic signalling in the region, with Beijing keen to present itself as a major diplomatic actor even amid contesting narratives about who actually helped quell one of the year’s most serious India-Pakistan escalations.