CHINA BAR ON BORDER ROAD ANGERS INDIA

Published on December 1, 2009 by brooks | This story has been viewed 94 times

Tensions between New Delhi and Beijing have flared again along their disputed Himalayan border, after Chinese soldiers ordered Indian villagers to stop constructing a road in the remote Ladakh region.

The 8km road was being built by villagers in a corner of Jammu and Kashmir state, near the de facto border with China, as part of New Delhi’s rural employment guarantee scheme, designed to boost rural incomes while developing local infrastructure.

Officials in Jammu and Kashmir said yesterday they had reported the incident to New Delhi and had sought guidance. “Chinese stopped the construction work, saying it was their territory, even though the village falls well within Indian territory,” Chering Dorjay, chief councillor of the Ladakh Autonomous Hill Development Council, told an Indian TV channel.

Rigzin Jora, Jammu and Kashmir’s tourism minister, who comes from the Ladakh region, described the Chinese soldiers’ intervention as “unacceptable”, and said the roadwork should be completed despite their opposition.

“If we are building roads on our border, it is none of China’s business to raise any objections,” he said. “They must stay out of it. Even if they do raise an objection, we must go ahead with our own development works.”

The flare-up over the village road in the Buddhist region comes just a week after Manmohan Singh, India’s prime minister, expressed chagrin at what he called a new “assertiveness” by China in its approach to the long-standing border dispute with India.

Although the two sides have publicly pledged to maintain peace along the line of control and to settle disputes through dialogue, Indian policymakers have been rattled by China’s growing stridency over the border issue.

For example, Beijing objected to an Asian Development Bank multi-year lending strategy for India because it envisioned loans for the remote north-eastern state of Arunachal Pradesh, which China refers to as “southern Tibet” and claims as its own. The problem was circumvented with the ADB agreeing to implement projects in India on a “one by one” basis.

Brahma Chellaney, a professor of strategic studies at the Centre for Policy Research, called the Chinese stance along the border “part of a deliberate strategy to exert pressure on India and send a message over India’s growing relationship with the US”, noting that border tensions flared only after a substantial improvement in ties between New Delhi and Washington in 2006.

Even before the current ruckus over the road, Prof Chellaney said, Chinese soldiers had been increasingly aggressive in that corner of Ladakh. “There have been a number of incidents involving Chinese troops trying to extend the line of control in that area, inch-by-inch,” he said. “Indians are concerned not to provoke hostilities and basically allow the Chinese to have their way.”

Indian military officials have expressed concern that New Delhi has long neglected roads and infrastructure in its border areas, in contrast to the work done by China.

Possibly Related Posts:


Filed under: China