Both the Indian and Chinese armies have brought in more troops in sensitive locations like Demchok, Daulat Beg Oldie and areas around Galwan river as well as Pangong Tso lake in Ladakh, the sources said. The area around Galwan has been a point of friction between the two sides for over six decades.
The Indian Army has been matching up to the Chinese build up in both Pangong Tso lake and Galwan Valley, the two locations in Ladakh which have witnessed major reinforcement of troops in the last two weeks, sources said. There was very little chance of easing of tension anytime soon as both sides are aggressively holding onto their respective positions, they said.
The sources said the focus of the talks was to take forward the disengagement process in friction points like Hot Springs, Gogra and Depsang in eastern Ladakh.
Two British soldiers were gunned down on Monday by a man in an Afghan army uniform in southern Afghanistan's Helmand province, officials said in Kabul.
India on Wednesday delivered a strong message to China that the 'unprecedented' incident in the Galwan Valley will have a 'serious impact' on the bilateral relationship and held the 'pre-meditated' action by Chinese army directly responsible for the violence that left 20 Indian Army personnel dead.
Indian and Chinese troops remained engaged in an eyeball-to-eyeball situation in several disputed areas.
People familiar with the situation in the region said the two sides were engaged in trying to resolve the dispute, but there was no indication of a positive outcome yet as both the armies continued to bolster their positions in disputed areas of Pangong Tso and Galwan Valley and Demchok.
The talks between the two armies are going to be held this week at multiple locations including Patroling point 14 (Galwan area), Patrolling point 15, and Hot Springs area, top government sources said.
Four Chinese soldiers were killed in the fierce clash with the Indian Army in the Galwan Valley in eastern Ladakh in June last year, the People's Liberation Army (PLA) acknowledged for the first time on Friday.
Verma also sought quashing of a note issued by the defence ministry rejecting his plea against Singh's appointment.
The intrusions into India were likely carried out by the PLA's better trained and equipped 'mobile operational units'.
This is the first such incident along the border with China that Indian armed forces personnel have been killed after a gap of nearly 45 years.
'When the war against Ukraine that Putin started is not going the way he was expecting it to and his military options are getting onerous, a bit of nuclear sabre rattling is what he hopes will turn things around for him and Russia.'
While the de-escalation process was underway, a violent face-off took place on Monday night between Indian and Chinese troops leading to the death of 20 Indian soldiers.
The US hopes that the differences will be resolved peacefully, officials said in Washington.
Nine Lankan soldiers were also killed.
Sahu fell into the unused 80-feet-deep borewell, located in the backyard of his house in Pihrid village in Malkharoda development block, around 2 pm on Friday while playing.
India is likely to convey to Russia that its troops would not be participating in the multinational military exercise Kavkaz-2020 where Chinese and Pakistani troops are also going to be there.
The Indian side is expected to present specific proposals at the talks to deescalate tension in Pangong Tso, Galwan Valley and Demchok -- the three areas in eastern Ladakh where the two sides have been on a bitter standoff for last one month, the sources said.
There were Vedic mantras engraved along with prayer songs for Lord Shiva, Lord Rama and Lord Krishna. Neither the government nor the people of Faisalabad demanded that the carvings be removed. I felt very happy to see Sanskrit shloka
The activation of diplomatic channels is likely to yield better results than a simmering hostility, recommends Ajai Shukla.
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.
Many of them sustained minor injuries in the clash near Naku La in the Sikkim sector along the Sino-Indo border on Saturday
The Southern Naval command on Wednesday called off its 14-day long rescue operations in flood-hit Kerala, saying there were no more requests for evacuation as waters receding in affected areas.
With the tropical cyclone Tauktae set to cross the Gujarat coast and make a landfall as an 'extremely severe cyclonic storm' by Monday night, the state government has shifted over 1.5 lakh people to safer places and mobilised disaster response teams.
In the review meeting, Singh told the top military brass to continue to deal with the situation in eastern Ladakh and other areas with "firmness".
The emperor's appetite for enlarging his realm translated into a fetish for raising taxes, despite the simplicity of his personal lifestyle, points out Devangshu Datta.
Over 24 Tigers rebels are believed to have been killed on Sunday when the Sri Lankan Navy attacked and destroyed a ship carrying arms for the LTTE. "There were 24 to 25 people aboard the ship and we believe all of them have been killed," Defence Spokesman Udaya Nanayakkara said. The Lankan naval task group comprising Off Shore Patrol vessels SLNS Sayura, SLNS Sagara, Fast Attack Vessel SLNS Suranimila and Rendezvous vessel 521 were engaged in the elite operation.
It is learnt that Defence Minister Rajnath Singh has conveyed to top military brass that there was no need for reviewing the implementation of any of the key projects along the Line of Actual Control (LAC) in Ladakh, Sikkim, Uttarakhand or in Arunachal Pradesh in view of the aggressive behaviour by Chinese troops in several sensitive areas.
Indian military sources said no firearms were used in the clashes and that most of the injuries were sustained following stone-pelting and use of rods by the Chinese side.
The two sides have already held at least 12 rounds of talks between local commanders and three rounds of talks between major general-rank officials but no positive outcome came out from the discussions, they said.
A top police official said that Pakistan is trying to infiltrate terrorists along the LoC in Jammu and Kashmir even during the winters when most of the passes and mountainous areas along the border are covered in heavy snow.
China said that after this incident both sides are in communication and coordination on the matter through diplomatic and military channels.
For both India and China, the most likely option -- and the most challenging -- appears to be a freezing of the status quo.
Instead of "the dragon and the elephant compete with each other", "the dragon and the elephant dance together, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi said.
The 1971 war reaffirmed the importance of inspirational senior leadership in battle and heralded the emergence of a new fighting class amongst officers and men of India's armed forces.
Vice Admiral Singh is scheduled to take charge as the new Navy chief from incumbent Admiral Sunil Lanba, who is set to demit office on May 31.
Under the India-China agreement on the disengagement process in eastern Ladakh, the Chinese army will pull back its troops to east of Finger 8 areas in the northern bank of Pangong lake, Defence Minister Rajnath Singh said in Parliament on Thursday, in what is seen as a significant step to dial down tensions in the key face-off site.
Here's a collection of some of the best photos from around the world shot in the last 24 hours.
Soumya Santosh worked as a caregiver attending to an old woman at a house in the southern Israeli coastal city of Ashkelon.
