China has called on India to withdraw its troops from a disputed Himalayan plateau before talks can take place to settle the most protracted standoff in recent years between the two nations.
India must pull back its troops “as soon as possible” as a precondition to demonstrate sincerity, Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesman Geng Shuang (耿爽) told reporters at a daily news briefing.
His comments came after weeks of saber-rattling in New Delhi and Beijing as officials from both sides talk up a potential clash even bloodier than their 1962 war, which left thousands dead.
The standoff could spill over into the G20 summit in Germany, which begins today, where Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi are expected to meet at a gathering of leaders from five emerging economies on the sidelines of the main event.
The month-long standoff and unconfirmed reports of troop buildups on both sides of the border have also underscored the swiftly deteriorating relations between the two nations.
China complained when Tibetan spiritual leader the Dalai Lama, who lives in exile in India, visited the contested Arunachal Pradesh region in April, which India said amounted to interference in its internal affairs.
China also appeared frustrated that India has refused to join its continent-wide “One Belt, One Road” infrastructure initiative, which includes a key component in Pakistan, India’s archrival, but one of China’s staunchest allies.
Meanwhile, India has protested China using its position at the UN to effectively stymie India’s efforts to gain permanent membership in the UN Security Council or label Pakistani militant Masood Azhar a terrorist.
Despite a litany of grievances on both sides, frequent clashes on the 3,500km shared border have been the most prominent irritant in efforts to build stable bilateral ties, said Zhang Li (張立), an expert on China-India relations at Sichuan University.
“The border clashes show how fragile and volatile the relationship can be,” Zhang said, adding that the latest flare-up took place in an area relatively free of past trouble and not previously contested.
The dispute flared last month after Chinese teams began building a road on territory also claimed by Bhutan.
Although China and Bhutan have been negotiating the precise border for decades without serious incident, the tiny Himalayan kingdom sought help this time from its longtime ally, India, which sent troops onto the plateau to stop the Chinese workers.
Since then, videos have emerged of Indian and Chinese soldiers blocking each other with their arms and jostling, without coming to blows.
Incensed with India’s involvement, China retaliated by closing a nearby mountain pass that Indian pilgrims use to reach Mount Kailash, a sacred Hindu and Buddhist site in Tibet.
The Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affiars also presented to reporters historical documents that it says prove China’s claims to the plateau.
That has not stopped the two-way sniping.
After Chinese officials said India should learn “historic lessons” from its defeat in the 1962 war, Indian Minister of Defense Arun Jaitley said that “India in 2017 is different from India in 1962,” an apparent reference to its improved military strength.
While Indian media have issued warnings about Chinese expansionism, Chinese state media have also ramped up the rhetoric, with the Global Times on Wednesday saying that Beijing would make no concessions.
Zhang said that the conduct of the militaries and foreign ministries on both sides has been relatively restrained and “within normal bounds.”
Abhijnan Rej, a fellow at the Observer Research Foundation, a New Delhi-based think tank, said that India needed to “show resolve” as China tries to pry away its traditional allies like Bhutan and assert itself as the region’s leader.
China has “exhibited a larger pattern in the last two years” and sees itself as an Asian hegemon, Rej said. “You don’t become that by playing by the rules.”
POLITICAL PRISONERS VS DEPORTEES: Venezuela’s prosecutor’s office slammed the call by El Salvador’s leader, accusing him of crimes against humanity Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele on Sunday proposed carrying out a prisoner swap with Venezuela, suggesting he would exchange Venezuelan deportees from the US his government has kept imprisoned for what he called “political prisoners” in Venezuela. In a post on X, directed at Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, Bukele listed off a number of family members of high-level opposition figures in Venezuela, journalists and activists detained during the South American government’s electoral crackdown last year. “The only reason they are imprisoned is for having opposed you and your electoral fraud,” he wrote to Maduro. “However, I want to propose a humanitarian agreement that
ECONOMIC WORRIES: The ruling PAP faces voters amid concerns that the city-state faces the possibility of a recession and job losses amid Washington’s tariffs Singapore yesterday finalized contestants for its general election on Saturday next week, with the ruling People’s Action Party (PAP) fielding 32 new candidates in the biggest refresh of the party that has ruled the city-state since independence in 1965. The move follows a pledge by Singaporean Prime Minister Lawrence Wong (黃循財), who took office last year and assumed the PAP leadership, to “bring in new blood, new ideas and new energy” to steer the country of 6 million people. His latest shake-up beats that of predecessors Lee Hsien Loong (李顯龍) and Goh Chok Tong (吳作棟), who replaced 24 and 11 politicians respectively
Archeologists in Peru on Thursday said they found the 5,000-year-old remains of a noblewoman at the sacred city of Caral, revealing the important role played by women in the oldest center of civilization in the Americas. “What has been discovered corresponds to a woman who apparently had elevated status, an elite woman,” archeologist David Palomino said. The mummy was found in Aspero, a sacred site within the city of Caral that was a garbage dump for more than 30 years until becoming an archeological site in the 1990s. Palomino said the carefully preserved remains, dating to 3,000BC, contained skin, part of the
Young women standing idly around a park in Tokyo’s west suggest that a giant statue of Godzilla is not the only attraction for a record number of foreign tourists. Their faces lit by the cold glow of their phones, the women lining Okubo Park are evidence that sex tourism has developed as a dark flipside to the bustling Kabukicho nightlife district. Increasing numbers of foreign men are flocking to the area after seeing videos on social media. One of the women said that the area near Kabukicho, where Godzilla rumbles and belches smoke atop a cinema, has become a “real
RSS