Ahead of a possible Summit meeting between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Chinese President Xi Jinping at the upcoming BRICS Summit in New Delhi, a meeting was held between the Indian and Chinese armies at corps commander-level in Arunachal Pradesh’s Kibithoo region to review the situation along the Line of Actual Control (LAC) and focus on maintaining peace and tranquillity along the frontier. The Indian delegation was led by Lt General Girish Kalia, commander of the Dimapur based 3 Corps. The Chinese side was led by General Liu Xiaowu, the Deputy Commander of the Peoples Liberation Army (PLA) , Western Theatre Command. But no official statement was issued at the conclusion of the meeting.
The talks were held at the Wacha-Damai border meeting point, days after India and China held a fresh round of Special Representative (SR) talks in Beijing on the long-pending boundary dispute. What is of significance is that Wacha-Damai border meeting point which is located in Upper Subansiri region of Arunachal Pradesh where the talks were held comes amid reports of increased military activity by Chinese troops along the LAC.
At the August 25 SR talks, National Security Adviser Ajit Doval and Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi discussed the boundary question, including the delimitation of the frontier, as well as trans-boundary cooperation. India had stressed the importance of maintaining peace and tranquillity in the border areas for the continued development of bilateral ties. Doval had said that the improvement in relations between the two countries was directly linked to both sides maintaining peace along the frontier.
Doval and Wang are the designated Special Representatives for the India-China boundary negotiations, a mechanism established in 2003 to seek a political settlement to the 3,488-km-long border dispute.
The latest military-level engagement comes as India and China have taken several steps in recent months to stabilise ties, which deteriorated sharply following the 2020 Galwan Valley clashes. The now-stable bilateral relationship, the expected India visit of Chinese President Xi Jinping for the BRICS summit over the weekend, as well as the last round of India-China boundary talks by special representatives National Security Adviser Ajit Doval and Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi in Beijing in August, may have prompted the first corps commander-level talks in this sector.
The eastern sector covers 1,400 kilometres (km), running along Sikkim and Arunachal Pradesh.
In July, tension emerged in Taksing, a remote village in the Upper Subansiri district of Arunachal Pradesh after locals sighted PLA soldiers or markings in a “not-demarcated part” of the nearby border, according to sources who spoke on the condition of anonymity. The Indian Army has patrolled the area in the past, as has the PLA, according to the sources. It is not uncommon to find damaged bunkers or “markings such as left-behind small rocks” along patches of the border but this might have been an unexpected appearance by the PLA or their graffiti.
It is unclear if Indian Army deployment to the border in Arunachal Pradesh has increased since but patterns of troop movements might have changed, including the holding of exercises, according to the sources.
Since the Sino-Indian war of 1962, China has claimed the Indian state of Arunachal Pradesh, even calling it Nanzang (“southern Tibet”) in government communication. Xizang is the official Chinese name for Tibet. To counter Chinese cartographic campaigns of renaming places in other countries, the Indian government, in August, officially standardised the names of 27 locations and natural features in Arunachal Pradesh on its maps.
The western sector of the India-China border runs along Ladakh and the Chinese-controlled Aksai Chin region, which India claims. This sector of some 2,000 km is the most militarised zone of the India-China border. Most rounds of military talks between India and China have taken place on this. The middle sector, a 625 km or so stretch along Himachal Pradesh and Uttarakhand in India, and Tibet in China, is the least contentious part of the border dispute.
A joint statement after the Doval-Wang meeting said the two countries agreed to promptly address any ground situation through existing diplomatic and military channels. That was among “eight outcomes” in August.
– The writer is a senior journalist and media consultant. The views expressed are of the writer and do not necessarily reflect the views of Raksha Anirveda.
