New Delhi – India on Thursday accused China of cross-border intrusion by troops and said the incident last month ran counter to the spirit of a landmark accord to maintain peace on the disputed frontiers.
The foreign ministry said New Delhi has taken up the issue through diplomatic channels with Beijing.
India alleged that while Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee was winding up a historic six-day trip to China on June 26 in Shanghai, a ‘Chinese patrol’ crossed the Line of Actual Control (LAC) into the Upper Subansiri district of the northeastern Indian State of Arunachal Pradesh.
India and China, who fought a brief but bitter war in 1962, are yet to demarcate their regions with an established border and instead they bank on the post-conflict LAC to identify their respective territories.
“This is an area where there are differences in the perception of the LAC between the two sides,” Indian Foreign Ministry spokesman Navtej Sarna told reporters in New Delhi.
He said the “transgression” of the LAC did not conform to the historic pact of 1996, signed by New Delhi and Beijing during a visit here by then Chinese president Jiang Zemin.
“The agreement of 1996 between India and China on confidence-building measures in the military field along the LAC contains a specific provision for the manner in which situations involving face-to-face contact between patrols of the two sides are to be handled,” Sarna said.
“In the case in question, these provisions do not appear to have been adhered to by the Chinese side,” he added.
China and India appear to have sorted out their disputes over Chinese-ruled Tibet and Sikkim during Vajpayee’s landmark visit last month, and both are now approaching talks on persistent border disputes.
The spokesman declined comment on an article on Thursday in the Hindustan Times newspaper reporting that on the same date, a 10-member Indian team had intruded into China and were caught, disarmed and released after an interrogation.
