(TibetanReview.net, Sep18’21) – While China came out silent on the matter, India said Sep 17, after a meeting of their foreign ministers, that their military and diplomatic officials should meet again for discussions on speedily resolving remaining issues related to the standoff on the Line of Actual Control (LAC). The development followed a meeting between them, their first since Jul 14, on the sidelines of a meeting of Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) foreign ministers in Dushanbe, capital of Tajikistan.
A readout issued by China’s foreign ministry after the meeting between India’s external affairs minister S Jaishankar and his Chinese counterpart Wang Yi on the margins of the SCO Summit only spoke of consolidating the “disengagement results of the frontline troops,” noted the hindustantimes.com ep 17.
Jaishankar has said in a set of tweets that he had discussed disengagement in the border areas with Wang, and “underlined that progress in this regard is essential for restoration of peace and tranquillity, which is the basis for development of bilateral ties”.
Earlier, after several rounds of military and diplomatic talks after their Jul 14 meeting, India and China withdrew frontline troops and armoured units from the north and south banks of Pangong Lake, Ladakh, in February. And in August, the two sides ended forward deployments at Gogra and dismantled all temporary structures in this area, the report noted.
India has linked disengagement at other friction points on the LAC, including Hot Spring and Depsang, to the overall normalisation of bilateral relations. China, however, has said the LAC standoff should be delinked from other aspects of relations between the two sides.
Previous Indian media reports said China was unwilling to discuss further disengagement in eastern Ladakh, contending that there were no further withdrawals of Chinese troops to discuss.
Jaishankar was reported to have told China that their bilateral relations will only develop when both countries pull their troops back from a confrontation on their disputed Himalayan border, a view not shared by China. Beijing contends that the border issue should not affect overall bilateral ties.
China talks only about proper management of the border disagreement, rather than resolving it.
