Chinese and Indian troops have again confronted each other along the disputed borderline, during which shots were fired and no casualties have been reported.
Indian soldiers illegally crossed the border into the Shen Pao Mountain area on the southern shore of Bangong Lake in the western part of the border on Monday and fired shots at and threatened Chinese border guards who came out to negotiate with them, the Chinese side was forced to take countermeasures to stabilize the situation, Chinese army spokesman in the western theater said in a statement Tuesday (Sept. 8, 2020). The statement accused the Indian side of serious military provocation and said China will resolutely defend the country’s territorial sovereignty, but did not specify what kind of measures the Chinese army took in response to the Indian side’s threats of firing shots.
The Indian Army issued a statement on Tuesday calling the Chinese Army’s Western Theater statement an attempt to mislead domestic and international public opinion. The Indian Army statement said that the Indian soldiers did not cross the Line of Actual Control (LAC) at all, nor did they engage in offensive behavior such as firing. In the Sept. 7 incident, the statement said, Chinese soldiers attempted to approach Indian soldiers deployed near the LAC and were dissuaded from doing so, so they fired in the air in an attempt to intimidate the Indian soldiers. The Indian Army statement said that despite serious provocation, Indian soldiers exercised great restraint and acted with maturity and responsibility, but the Indian Army is determined to protect its national sovereignty at any cost.
In June, Indian and Chinese troops clashed in the area, resulting in the deaths of 20 Indian soldiers, but the Chinese side has not released the number of Chinese casualties.
The two defense ministers met in Moscow last Friday (September 4) in an attempt to ease growing tensions along the disputed border in the Ladakh region, but there appears to have been no breakthrough. At the meeting, Chinese Defense Minister Wei Fenghe accused the Indian side of being solely responsible for the border tensions, saying that China cannot lose an inch of its territory, official Chinese media reported.
Military experts in both countries say that the chain of events of the past few months shows that the border situation is unpredictable and that miscalculations on either side could lead to a war that neither country wants.
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