SRINAGAR, India (AP) – China and India are withdrawing frontline troops from disputed parts of their mountain border where they have been stranded for months, both countries said.
Troops began unraveling on Wednesday at the southern and northern shores of Lake Pangong in the Ladakh region, they said.
India and China will remove forward deployments in a ‘phased, coordinated and verified manner’, Indian Defense Minister Rajnath Singh told parliament on Thursday.
The Chinese Ministry of Defense said in a statement on Wednesday that both parties had begun a “synchronized and organized” decoupling.
The tense uprising high in the Karakoram Mountains began in May, when Indian and Chinese soldiers ignored each other’s repeated verbal warnings, causing a screaming match, stone-throwing and fistfights on the northern shore of Pangong Lake, where disputed reefs slide into the glacial lake from eight directions and are referred to. as ‘fingers’.
By June, it had increased and spread northward into Depsang and Galwan Valley, where India had built a military road for all weather conditions along the disputed border. Tension erupts in hand-to-hand fighting with batons, stones and fists killing 20 Indian soldiers. It is believed that China also had victims but gave no details.
Since then, both countries have supported tens of thousands of soldiers stationed by artillery, tanks and fighter jets along the de facto border, called the Line of Actual Control, or LAC, with troops deployed for the harsh winter.
Each accused the other of inciting violence. They started military and diplomatic talks on ending the crisis, which dramatically changed the India-China relationship.
China did not provide details of the decoupling in its brief statement. Singh said the “Chinese side will keep its presence on the northern shore of the east of Finger 8.”
India already claims eight fingers at Lake Pangong, but its military presence extends to Finger 3. The area between Fingers 4 and 8 has traditionally been patrolled by both sides before the situation escalated in May, although China claimed the area.
According to India, Chinese soldiers occupied the area between Fingers 4 and 8 last year. India responded in August by occupying at least three uninhabited mountain peaks on the southern shore of the lake, during which the two parties fired warning shots for the first time in 45 years, sparking the fear of a full-scale military conflict. and led to Beijing furiously demanding the withdrawal of Indian troops.
“Reciprocally, the Indian troops will be based on their permanent base” near Finger 3, Singh said. A similar action will be taken in the southern bank on both sides. ‘
Singh said the two parties had also agreed on a ‘temporary moratorium on military activities’ on the north shore of the lake. “Patrol will only resume when both parties reach an agreement in diplomatic and military talks that will take place thereafter,” he said.
Lt.Gen. DS Hooda, who was head of the Indian Army’s Northern Command under the Ladakh region from 2014 to 2016, said the agreement was an important step towards comprehensive decoupling and finding a solution to the existing issues between the two countries. . ”
He said it would take a while for the two countries to rebuild trust and enter into new agreements. “The ongoing crisis has led to a great deal of mistrust and a complete breakdown of agreements and protocols that have kept peace along the line of control,” he said.
But some Indian experts said the development meant the Indian government had accepted Beijing’s position on the disputed territory.
“Talking about mutual withdrawal from Pangong positions is just a smokescreen!” Tweeted Ajai Shukla, a former Indian military officer and a defense commentator.
“From the beginning, China’s real military objective in East Ladakh has been Depsang. There is no word to be heard about it, ‘he said.
Depsang, one of the most important areas in the region, is where India has the world’s highest landing strip and where the Chinese army, according to Shukla, has entered 15 to 18 kilometers within the areas held by India.
The LAC separates areas held by China and India from Ladakh in the west to the eastern state of Arunachal Pradesh of India, which China claims as a whole. LAC is broken into parts where the Himalayan nations of Nepal and Bhutan border China. It divides areas of physical control rather than territorial claims.
India claims the Chinese-controlled Aksai Chin plateau as part of the Ladakh region. According to India, the control line is 3,488 kilometers (2,167 miles) long, while China says it is significantly shorter.
Relations between the two countries were often strained, in part because of their disputed border. They waged a border war in 1962 that spilled over into Ladakh and ended in a turbulent ceasefire. Since then, troops have guarded the undefined border and occasionally wrestled. They agreed not to attack each other with firearms.
The current absence is over disputed parts of a pristine mountainous landscape that boasts a glacier that feeds one of the largest irrigation systems in the world and is a critical link in China’s massive infrastructure project “Belt and Road”.
India unilaterally declared Ladakh a federal territory and separated it from the disputed Kashmir in August 2019, ending the semi-autonomous status of the Indian-run Kashmir. It also promises to take back the Aksai Chin plateau.
According to some Indian and Chinese strategic experts, India’s move has exacerbated tensions with China, which led to the June border collision.
China was one of the first countries to strongly condemn the move at international forums, including the UN Security Council.
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Associated Press author Huizhong Wu in Taipei, Taiwan, contributed to this report.