Both countries have reached a mutual agreement for disengagement of troops from the most contentious area of North and South Pangong Lake.
'With continued focus on votes, upcoming by-polls and purchasing politicians, the political hierarchy has little time for national defence.' 'They would do well to heed a veteran scholar, who says, "There will be war with China in the next few years. The next full scale war will have the involvement of Pakistan and terror elements, insurgents and intelligence assets operating inside India",' warns Lieutenant General Prakash Katoch (retd).
Situated at a height of 15,200 feet above sea level, the pass sits on the top of a craggily formed Himalayan range that separates the Tibetan plateau from the Indian sub-continent.
Her comments come a day after External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar said in Geneva that roughly 75 percent of the "disengagement problems" with China are sorted out but the bigger issue has been the increasing militarisation of the frontier.
India and China on Thursday agreed to hold the next round of military talks at an early date to achieve the objective of complete disengagement in remaining friction points in eastern Ladakh.
Without mentioning the boundary dispute, the spokesperson said that China-India relations have been stable on the whole and "our two sides have maintained dialogue and communication at various levels".
'Our brave Indian soldiers don't reply to raining of bricks with mere sticks, they do so with iron rods'
China does not have to give up what it took in 2020, it will never give up its claim to Arunachal Pradesh, Ladakh and other areas, and it has all the time now to plan its next surprise, points out Lieutenant General Prakash Katoch (retd).
Anjaw MLA and state's women and child development minister Dasanglu Pul confirmed that the duo went missing along the border with China while looking for medicinal herbs.
China on Thursday said it 'firmly opposes' the United States recognition of Arunachal Pradesh as part of Indian territory and affirmed that Washington, DC has nothing to do with the India-China border dispute.
The disengagement of troops of the Indian Army and China's People's Liberation Army from the Line of Actual Control was reached after sustained negotiations at the military and diplomatic level, said the ministry of external affairs last week.
China has chosen to keep New Delhi guessing, while retaining for itself the option of constantly changing facts on the ground and shifting the LAC westwards -- the strategy called 'salami slicing', notes Ajai Shukla.
A joint statement released on Thursday said both sides exchanged views in an 'open and constructive' manner to resolve the 'relevant issues' and that it was agreed to maintain 'security and stability' on the ground in the region.
The talks are following up the outcome of the 19th round of Corps Commander-level talks held between the two sides on August 13-14 at the Chushul Moldo border meeting point.
The talks till now have resulted in the resolution of issues in North and South Bank of Pangong Tso, Galwan and Gogra Hot Spring areas.
The development comes after after reaching a consensus in the 16th round of military talks, the two sides said in a joint statement this evening.
'Given China's past behaviour and their territorial claims, should we be sceptical regarding China's willingness to adhere to these agreements fully? The answer is yes.' 'As Ronald Reagan famously said in the context of the SALT talks, 'Trust, but verify!' India should also do the same.' 'This has already begun with foot patrolling, drones, satellite imagery and so on. India's military deployment did mirror China's and will continue to do so in the future.'
This meeting is taking place after a gap of around four months.
India and China on Friday held 'in-depth' discussions on addressing the remaining issues along the Line of Actual Control (LAC) in eastern Ladakh, holding that disengagement in the North and South banks of Pangong lake provided a good basis to work towards their early resolution.
China, which claims Arunachal Pradesh as South Tibet, routinely objects to Indian leaders' visits to the state to highlight its claims. Beijing has also named the area Zangnan.
India and China are likely to hold another round of diplomatic talks this week on eastern Ladakh with a focus on moving forward in disengagement of troops in the remaining friction points, people familiar with the development said on Tuesday.
'A lack of strategic trust and the 'persistent security dilemma' prevails between India and China,' points out Dr Rup Narayan Das.
External Affairs Ministry Spokesperson Anurag Srivastava said the diplomatic and military talks have helped both sides to enhance understanding of each other's positions on the issue.
India and China achieved a major milestone this year when their bilateral trade crossed the landmark figure of $100 billion but it did not generate any fanfare in both capitals as the two Asian giants are going through a "particularly bad patch" in their relations due to a set of actions by Beijing in violation of agreements that led to the military standoff in eastern Ladakh. Starting with a modest $1.83 billion in 2001, the bilateral trade crossed $100 billion-mark in the first 11 months this year, a significant milestone for which the two countries carried out campaigns to boost trade and build it as a major stakeholder to improve the relations between two nations, whose ties otherwise remained frosty over the festering boundary dispute and strategic rivalry. According to last month's data from China's General Administration of Customs (GAC), the India-China bilateral trade totalled $114.263 billion, up 46.4 per cent year-on-year from January to November 2021.
The talks came a day after the two armies began a limited disengagement in a few areas in Galwan Valley and Hot Spring in a demonstration of their intent to end the row peacefully.
The last meeting between the two sides at the Corps Commander level was held in December last year.
The Jaishankar-Wang talks came amid the dragging border row in eastern Ladakh that entered its fifth year in May.
The two countries reviewed the situation in the region during a fresh round of online diplomatic talks under the framework of the Working Mechanism for Consultation and Coordination (WMCC) on border affairs.
'Unquestionably, the spirit behind the Panchsheel agreement and the 'Hindi Chini bhai bhai' slogan were thrown overboard by the Chinese, and a trust deficit was injected between the two nations.' A revealing excerpt from General J J Singh's The McMahon Line: A Century Of Discord.
The talks will focus on 'delimitation of the border, boundary management and a host of bilateral and international issues'.
According to the World Bank, economic growth in middle-income countries, including India, is not accelerating. 'In fact, it is slowing down as incomes increase, with the trend becoming more pronounced each decade.'
Colombo seems to be veering to the middle path between China and the US on global matters, but in regional matters of strategic security, it is increasingly identifying with India, points out N Sathiya Moorthy.
Until Delhi and Beijing resolve outstanding border issues within an accelerated time frame, standoffs like Doklam will be repeated across various peaks along the Himalayas, says Mathew Maavak.
China on Friday operationalised its first fully electrified bullet train in the remote Himalayan region of Tibet, connecting the provincial capital Lhasa and Nyingchi, a strategically located Tibetan border town close to Arunachal Pradesh.
China stunned Pakistan 2-0 in the shoot-out to enter the final of Hero Asian Champions Trophy for the first time in the history of the tournament.
Twenty personnel of the India-China LAC guarding Indo-Tibetan Border Police (ITBP) force, who displayed bravery during the violent clashes and ongoing military standoff between the two countries in the eastern Ladakh region in May-June 2020, were on Sunday decorated with police gallantry medals.
'The events of 2020 have actually put our relationship under exceptional stress.' What External Affairs Minister Dr Subrahmanyam Jaishankar told the All India Conference of China Studies on Thursday, January 28, 2021.
The 62nd Raising Day of the Indo-Tibetan Border Police Force was commemorated with great enthusiasm at the Seema Dwar in Dehradun.
The former Army Chief said India's relations with China will always remain "somewhat tense".
'My understanding is that by the time President Xi Jinping came for the Chennai summit [2019], he had already instructed his army to undertake the action in Galwan in the summer of 2020.'
