New Delhi: India on Thursday rejected Beijing’s second attempt within a week to put the blame on New Delhi for the border disturbances, saying it had no basis in facts, and added that it was China’s amassing of a large number of troops on the border and their provocative behaviour and unilateral attempts to alter status quo that led to the deadly skirmish last year.
“We had already made our position clear a few days back that we reject such statements which have no basis in facts,” the Ministry of External Affairs spokesperson Arindam Bagchi said.
“It was the amassing of large number of troops by the Chinese side, their provocative behaviour and unilateral attempts to alter status quo in contravention of all our bilateral agreements that resulted in serious disturbance of peace and tranquility along the LAC in Eastern Ladakh,” he said.
“China continues to deploy large number of troops and armaments in the border areas. It was in response to Chinese actions, that our armed forces had to make appropriate counter deployments in these areas to ensure that India’s security interests are fully protected.
“As emphasized by EAM in his meeting with Chinese FM earlier this month, it is our expectation that the Chinese side will work towards early resolution of the remaining issues along the LAC in Eastern Ladakh while fully abiding by bilateral agreements and protocols,” he said.
The response was to the Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Hua Chunying saying on Wednesday that India has “long pursued a ‘forward policy’ and illegally crossed the LAC to encroach on China’s territory, which is the root cause of the China-India border tension. China opposes any arms race in the disputed border areas for the purpose of competition over control,” she said.
On September 24 too, India had rejected China’s attempts to put the blame for the Galwan Valley incident of last year on New Delhi,.
During his bilateral meeting with Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi on September 16 on the sidelines of the SCO summit in Dushanbe, Tajikistan, External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar had conveyed that it is necessary to ensure progress in resolution of the remaining issues on the border in eastern Ladakh in order to restore peace and tranquillity along the LAC and noted that this has been an essential basis for progress in the bilateral ties.
The EAM had emphasized that the two sides should work towards early resolution of the remaining issues along the LAC in Eastern Ladakh while fully abiding by the bilateral agreements and protocols.
