Presence of Chinese Troop in the Southern Pangong Tsao Lake
Border disputes between India and China have emerged once again. There have been ‘provocative military movements’ along the southern bank of the Pangong Tsao lake. The military movements were directed towards changing the status quo which was decided earlier after the standoff along the LAC between the Indian Army and the People’s Liberation Army. The incident has supposedly taken place between August 29th and August 30th, 2020. A statement released by one of the Army officials mentioned, “They (PLA) violated the previous consensus arrived at during military and diplomatic engagements during the ongoing standoff in eastern Ladakh and carried out provocative military movements to change the status quo.”
The standoff between India and China in the Galwan Valley had started back in May 2020 which resulted in a serious loss of soldiers on both sides. Even after numerous statements issued for de-escalation and disengagement, the PLA seems to not move away from the area under Indian jurisdiction. The Chief of Defence Staff General Bipin Rawat had earlier mentioned that India has numerous ‘military option’ to deal with China, but till the present-day Chinese troops have continued to occupy Finger 5 and believes that LAC is at Finger 4 causing major contention between the two countries as a prolonged border dispute.
The issue of the border dispute with China is not pleasant if one refers to history. The Indo-China War of 1962 is one such example and EAM Jaishankar remarked that this standoff is ‘surely the most serious situation after 1962.’ He had mentioned it in an interview, “The quantum of forces currently deployed by both sides at the LAC is also unprecedented.” Chinese Officials have released a statement saying that there has not been any sort of violation and that the troops did not cross the LAC. On the other hand, the Ministry of Defence released statements mentioning of maintaining peace and tranquillity in the region.
A Brigade-Commander level flag meeting is underway in Chushul to resolve the issue and chalk out the future course of action.
Meanwhile, the Chinese Global Times referring to Chinese Spokesperson’s statement tried whitewashing this attempt by Beijing. It tweeted, “Fresh #China- #India border clash? Chinese FM on Monday said Chinese border troops have always strictly observed the Line of Actual Control and have never crossed the line. The border troops of the two countries have been in communication over territory issues.”. It was also retweeted by Ji Rong – Spokesperson of the Chinese Embassy in India.
