Nepal’s Foreign Minister Pradeep Gyawali has said that the country’s engagement with its immediate neighbors, India and China, has increased multifold in the last few years and the government is committed to maintaining friendly relations with neighbors and all other countries. 

“We maintain a close and cordial relationship with them based on goodwill, trust, mutual respect, and cooperation. Nepal fulfills its commitment not to allow any interference in her territory by neighbors and expects a similar spirit of cooperation from our neighbors on the matters of our concern,” Gyawali was quoted as saying by The Himalayan Times newspaper. 

High-level engagements with India further enhanced the ties between Nepal and India, he said, adding the relationship between the two neighbors characterized by robust people-to-people contacts, cultural linkages, and extensive economic partnership. 

The cooperation, he claimed, led to some of the remarkable projects like the Motihari-Amlekhgunj Petroleum Pipeline, the first cross-border pipeline in the region, operationalization of Integrated Check Post in Birgunj and Biratnagar, and completion of the Jaynagar-Kurtha section of the railway track. 

On its ties with China, he said the two nations enjoy “close and cordial” relations based on the five principles of  “peaceful co-existence”. He also reiterated Nepal’s support for “One China Policy”. 

“Appreciation of each other's aspirations as well as respect for each other's concerns and sensitivities has been the hallmark of our relationship,” Gyawali said, adding the ties witnessed substantive growth in the last some years.