Beijing: Despite the recent understanding reached between India and China on Sikkim's status, China's official Xinhua news agency on August 20 mentioned the North Eastern Indian state as a country.

"Sharing long borders with a number of neighbouring vantages in expanding border trade," it said in a report from Tibet's capital on the Himalayan region's foreign trade performance in recent years.

Interestingly, the report did not mention India among the countries that shared the border with the Tibet Autonomous Region (TAR).

During Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee's visit to China in June, India and China had signed a border trade protocol to add a third border crossing point in Sikkim, by which Indian officials said Sikkim will cease to be an issue in India-China relations.

PTI