Ahead of Chinese president’s visit, confrontations along border in Ladakh

NEW DELHI: Eastern Ladakh continues to be a flashpoint between India and China, with a flag meeting being held between rival military commanders on Monday after a troop face-off at Chumar to the south, while a “civilian confrontation” persisted in Demchok to the north.
India has strongly objected to the People’s Liberation Army’s attempt to construct a road leading right up to the Line of Actual Control (LAC) in the Chumar sector, one of the few sectors in eastern Ladakh where Indian positions and supply lines are much better than the PLA ones, said sources.
China, in turn, is flexing its muscles to stop Indian civilian workers from constructing a water irrigation channel under the NREGA scheme at Demchok for the last one week. Leh district collector S S Gill told journalists that the PLA had ferried a large number of Chinese civilians in its vehicles to the site to scuttle the ongoing construction work.
The Chinese civilians or graziers from a village called Toshigang, as per reports, have even pitched tents in the area.
All this comes just ahead of Chinese President Xi Jinping’s three-day visit to India beginning from September 17, though the Indian government sought to downplay the incidents. Asserting that border issues would be resolved at the local level, external affairs ministry spokesperson Syed Akbaruddin on Monday denied the MEA had been asked to intervene after Ladakh officials complained that the Chinese had intruded almost half-a-km into Indian territory.
However, "unresolved boundary issues will be addressed,” said Akbaruddin, referring to the bilateral discussions scheduled between PM Narendra Modi and the Chinese president during the visit.

File photo of Narendra Modi and Chinese President Xi Jinping
But the incident in the Chumar sector, which is virtually on the Ladakh-Himachal Pradesh border, seemed quite serious with the PLA troops outnumbering Indian soldiers by 3:1 during the face-off which began on Sunday.

Faced with the Indian troops objecting to the road construction, the PLA asked for a brigadier-level flag meeting. “Both sides put forward their views at the meeting held at Spanggur Gap on Monday afternoon. They discussed ways to defuse the tensions,” said a source.
Indian posts at Chumar has for long irked the PLA because they "look" into Chinese territory and can be used to track troops movements there. The sector has witnessed several "tense" incidents and face-offs between the two forces in recent years, with China already unhappy with India’s re-activation of the Daulat Beg Oldi (DBO), Fukche and Nyoma advanced landing grounds and construction of some posts to counter the massive infrastructure build-up by PLA in the region.

National Security Adviser Ajit Doval meets Chinese President Xi Jinping in Beijing (Reuters Photo)
In recent months, PLA troops have even violated the new bilateral border defence cooperation agreement (BDCA) by tailing Indian soldiers in eastern Ladakh, which led India to lodge a formal protest with China. The BDCA, inked in October last year, prohibits either side from tailing each other’s patrol in areas where there is “no common understanding” and dispute over where the LAC actually lies.
The "no tailing" clause is significant because a patrol following a rival patrol often triggers tensions and face-offs in the disputed areas. The BDCA, incidentally, was finalised following the 21-day face-off in April-May last year after PLA troops intruded 19 km into Depsang valley in the DBO sector.