New Delhi –
Soldiers from India and China clashed along the disputed border last week, India’s defense minister said on Tuesday, the latest incident of violence on the disputed border since a deadly brawl between the two armies in June 2020.
Speaking to lawmakers in parliament, Rajnath Singh said Friday’s clashes in the Tawang district of eastern Arunachal Pradesh began when Chinese troops “intruded into Indian territory” and “single-handedly The Chinese side seeks to change the “status quo areas along the disputed border near the Yangtze River.
Singh said no Indian soldiers were seriously injured and troops from both sides quickly evacuated the area. The Indian military said in a statement on Monday that soldiers from both sides suffered minor injuries.
He said local military commanders met on Sunday to discuss the dispute and that the Indian government had spoken to China through diplomatic channels.
Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Wang Wenning did not elaborate on the incident at his daily press conference, but said China hoped that India would work with India to implement the agreement reached between the two sides to “jointly maintain peace and tranquility in the border areas between China and India”.
Wang Yi said: “As far as we know, the current situation on the China-India border is generally peaceful and stable.”
For decades, India and China have been bitterly contesting the Line of Actual Control, a loose line of demarcation that separates the territory controlled by China and India from Ladakh in the west to Arunachal Pradesh in the east. The region has full sovereignty. In 1962, India and China fought a war over the border issue.
Soldiers from both sides have patrolled the disputed border area in recent years. The opposing soldiers were in constant contact, with the two Asian giants accusing each other of sending troops into each other’s territory.
In June 2020, clashes in the Karakoram range in Ladakh’s Galwan Valley sparked tension as soldiers fought with stones, fists and sticks. At least 20 Indian soldiers and 4 Chinese soldiers died. Both countries have deployed tens of thousands of troops along their de facto border with artillery, tanks and fighter jets.
Some Indian and Chinese soldiers have withdrawn from a key point of friction in Ladakh after repeated meetings between military commanders, but tensions between the two Asian powers remain.
In November, Indian Army Chief of Staff Manoj Pande said there had been “no significant reduction” in Chinese troop levels in Ladakh. He said the situation at the border was “stable but unpredictable”.