China on Tuesday dismissed reports of fresh incursions by its troops into India as "routine patrolling" and asserted that both countries have a very effective and smooth mechanism to handle border incidents.
'Tibetans will participate in future conflicts with India (in all probability, some were already present in Galwan).' 'As nobody in India would like to have a deadly fight with Tibetan soldiers and officers, the issue needs to be closely followed,' observes Claude Arpi.
Five villagers from Nacho area of the district, who went for hunting in a jungle were allegedly kidnapped by the PLA.
India said it is strongly committed to ensuring its sovereignty and territorial integrity.
A new military rank system had been introduced for the PLA, but all soldiers must always obey the Communist party, reveals Jayadeva Ranade, the distinguished China expert and retired RA&W officer.
'Could the Chinese have taken a leaf out of our book?' 'That their unprecedented build-up is their attempt at coercive diplomacy with India?' 'And if so, what is it that they could be expecting as a quid pro quo?' asks Shekhar Gupta.
The Central Committee members on Sunday elected a 25-member Political Bureau which picked the Standing Committee members to govern the country.
Narrowing of differences on competing territorial claims along the un-demarcated LAC might take weeks, if not months, of hard-nosed negotiations. Without some give and take on both sides, the impasse will be hard to resolve, observes Virendra Kapoor.
'The focus on countering terrorism brings to the issue Beijing's non-serious approach in this regard. India's permanent representative at the UN has raised in vain the issue of funding and the release of 26/11 suspect Zaki-ur Rehman Lakhvi. But China has blocked these objections since December 2014 at the UN even after 'highest levels' in India intervened,' notes Srikanth Kondapalli, reviewing the India-China military exercises in Kunming.
The Chinese military is now desperately attempting to give "ex post facto strategic meaning" to its actions in eastern Ladakh.
Chinese military has identified a host of problems after conducting massive military exercises for the first time to sharpen the troops' fighting capability which if not rectified will hinder its ability to win wars.
Against the backdrop of recent incursions by the Chinese troops, India and China on Saturday held a flag meeting in eastern Ladakh where the Indian side is understood to have raised concerns over detention of its nationals by the People's Liberation Army.
China's National Health Commission in its daily report on Monday said that 2,829 new cases of coronavirus were reported nationwide on February 2, taking the total number of infection to 17,205.
Chinese nationals teaching Mandarin in different parts of Pakistan have left for home after being called back by Beijing following the recent deadly attacks targeting them, an official of the Karachi University said on Monday.
China on Friday hiked its defence budget to $209 billion, maintaining a single-digit growth for the sixth consecutive year with a 6.8 per cent increase in 2021.
The attack was claimed by the outlawed Baloch Liberation Army (BLA) which said it would not tolerate 'any Chinese military expansionist endeavours on Baloch soil'.
After a gap of over two-and-half months, India and China on Sunday held the ninth round of military talks specifically focusing on ways to move forward on the long-negotiated disengagement process in eastern Ladakh as thousands of their troops remained deployed at friction points under freezing conditions.
Army chief General M M Naravane on Tuesday hoped for an amicable resolution of the military standoff with China in Ladakh through talks based on 'mutual and equal security' even as he said India will have to be prepared to deal with a 'two-front' threat scenario due to the potent and collusive threat from China and Pakistan.
"CCP's (Chinese Communist Party) territorial aggression is also apparent on its Indian border where China has attempted to seize control of the Line of Actual Control by force," US National Security Advisor Robert O'Brien said in a remark on China early this week in Utah.
With China reacting sharply to government's plans to construct a border road in Arunachal Pradesh, Home Minister Rajnath Singh on Thursday sent a strong message, asserting that no one can warn India.
The world has seen India's strength and commitment to protecting its borders and sovereignty, he said and paid rich tributes to the 20 soldiers who were killed during a violent clash with Chinese troops.
The IAF chief also said Pakistan has become a pawn of Chinese policy and its dependence on China would increase further in future. He said India needs to understand the interplay of some major events in its vicinity that would impact the security scenario of the region.
Calling for closer military ties between India and China, Defence Minister A K Antony on Saturday said that it would be easy to maintain peace along the borders if both the forces have trust, mutual respect and confidence.
India and China on Saturday held another round of military talks with a focus on taking forward the disengagement process in Hot Springs, Gogra and Depsang in eastern Ladakh and bring down the tensions in the region, official sources said.
The Chinese air force is now a 400,000-person force that flies some 2,000 combat aircraft -- more than thrice the size of the Indian Air Force.
The Chinese authorities have been rapidly building defence infrastructure along the Line of Actual Control, indicating that they are preparing for a long period of tension with India, points out Jayadeva Ranade, the former senior RA&W officer and China expert.
As per the sources, the discussions between the two sides include pulling back tanks and armoured vehicles from their present positions, and some development in this regard is likely to take place in the next few days.
"On the border issue, China always maintains that we should follow through on treaties and agreements we signed and we jointly uphold peace and tranquility at the border region," Foreign Ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin said while responding to Jaishankar's remarks.
The Chinese have been objecting to the presence of Indian Navy ships in the region where it has significantly expanded its presence since 2009 through artificial islands and military presence.
'If the Chinese intent is to be gauged based on its aggression in the South China Sea, greater forays in the Indian Ocean, a hawk's attitude towards Taiwan, flying its fighters repeatedly over the Senkaku islands in the East China Sea and creating strategic assets globally, there would be a requirement for strategic partnerships for India,' says Brigadier S K Chatterji (retd).
Coming ahead of the transition of power from Donald Trump's administration to President-elect Joe Biden's administration after the November 3 US presidential election, the detailed policy document highlights that China is undermining the security, autonomy and economic interests of many nations in the region.
China has said that it successfully carried out a land-based mid-course anti-ballistic missile (ABM) technical test on Sunday with Chinese experts claiming that the tests, stated to be the sixth of its kind, validated the reliability of the country's anti-ballistic missile umbrella.
Lt General Ranbir Singh described the situation in Kashmir as stable but fragile.
The PLA launched a campaign to stop food waste and cultivate thrifty habits in the military under the "clean plate" campaign launched by President Xi Jinping.
'There was a wrong policy of government during the Congress regime. They didn't construct roads up to the border which left a buffer zone of 3-4 km which China occupied. Construction of new villages isn't a new thing, it's all inherited from Congress'
As China begins rejuvenation of its military power, there is an urgent need for transformation of the Indian military, says Lieutenant General Anil Chait (retd).
The plane crashed in the city of Wuzhou, the Guangxi Zhuang autonomous region of China, causing a forest fire, Sputnik reported citing China Central Television (CCTV).
Experts have said the economic cost of China's misadventure in the last couple of months in eastern Ladakh and South China will be "massive" as it has "exposed" Beijing's "real face" when the entire world is fighting coronavirus.
The Chinese side has particularly bolstered its presence in the Galwan Valley, erecting around 100 tents in the last two weeks and bringing in heavy equipment for construction of bunkers, notwithstanding the stiff protest by Indian troops. There have been reports of multiple incidents of transgressions by Chinese troops in several areas in Eastern Ladakh.
'Under General Secretary of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) Xi Jinping, Beijing has stepped up its aggressive foreign policy toward New Delhi. Since 2013, China has engaged in five major altercations with India along the Line of Actual Control (LAC),' said a brief issued by US-China Economic and Security Review Commission.
