(TibetanReview.net, May03’24) —India has lodged a strong protest to China last week over the latter’s building of a road in Shaksgam Valley which belongs to it, and which also has the potential to threaten Indian defences in Siachen Glacier. This 5180 square-kilometre Indian territory was illegally ceded by Pakistan to China in 1963, noted the hindustantimes.com and other reports May 3.
India lodged its protest against China both in New Delhi and Beijing. Besides, road could be part of an alignment that links Karakoram Highway to Upper Shaksgam Valley, bordering the Siachen Glacier.
India’s ministry of external affairs (MEA) said India has never accepted the so-called China Pakistan Boundary Agreement of 1963 through which Pakistan unlawfully attempted to cede the area to China, and India has consistently conveyed its rejection of the same, noted the timesofindia.com May 3.
“We have registered our protest with the Chinese side against illegal attempts to alter facts on the ground. We further reserve the right to take necessary measures to safeguard our interests,” the report quoted MEA spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal as saying May 2.
India maintains that under the 1963 agreement, Pakistan illegally ceded to China 5,180 sq km of Indian territory in Shaksgam Valley from areas illegally occupied by it in the Union Territory of Ladakh. It has also maintained that China continues to be in illegal occupation of approximately 38,000 sq kms of Indian territory in Ladakh for the past six decades, the report said.
The new road transverses through 16333 feet Aghil Pass and could provide an alternative alignment to Karakoram Pass via Upper Shaksgam and thereon to Khunjerab Pass in Northern Areas of Pakistan-Occupied Jammu and Kashmir.
The hindustantimes.com report said the matter was of serious concern to India for if China extends the road to Upper Shaksgam Valley, then the Indian positions on Siachen Glacier will face twin threats — Pakistan in the South and China to the north. It is only logical to assume that the Indian Army will have to plan long term defences to deal with Chinese expansion in the Occupied Shaksgam Valley.
The report said that although the current road construction is a patch between two possible alignments in the long term, it is quite evident that China wants to link Lower and Upper Shaksgam valley through road and military outposts in order to pressurize Indian Army positions on Siachen Glacier and Saltoro Ridge.
India is stated to have been raising the issue of Shaksgam Valley in the Special Representative Dialogue on Boundary Resolution, the last of which was held in Dec 2019. This dialogue has, however, virtually been put on the backburner after Chinese PLA threw all the bilateral agreements out of the window and transgressed in East Ladakh in May 2020. India has no intention to allow Beijing to unilaterally impose the 1959 line on East Ladakh.
The report added that by lodging at least two protests in the past two years on road construction in Shaksgam Valley, India made it clear to China that it is right to protect its territory and will take measures to ensure that road construction is halted in the illegally occupied territory.