NEW DELHI: The foreign ministry of India stated on Tuesday that Arunachal Pradesh, a northeastern province bordering China, is a “integral and inalienable part of India” and that China is making “absurd claims” regarding it.
Arunachal Pradesh is allegedly a portion of southern Tibet according to China. Declaring that Arunachal Pradesh has always been a part of India, New Delhi disputes the assertion.
Speaking on Tuesday, Randhir Jaiswal, the spokesperson for India’s foreign ministry, stated, “Repeating baseless arguments in this regard does not lend such claims any validity.”
He was reacting to remarks made by China’s Ministry of National Defence spokesman Senior Colonel Zhang Xiaogang last week, which came a few days after Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi on March 9 officially opened a road tunnel in Arunachal Pradesh.
In a statement, Zhang said that the opening of the tunnel “runs counter to the efforts made by both sides to ease the border situation” and that India should “stop taking any moves that complicate the border issue and earnestly maintain peace and stability in the border areas”.
The 3,000 kilometre (1,860 km) border between the nuclear-armed nations is largely unmarked. In 2020, fighting occurred along their border in the western Himalayas that claimed the lives of at least 20 Indian soldiers and four Chinese soldiers.
Since those skirmishes, the armed forces of both nations have strengthened their fortifications and added more personnel and equipment to the border. In 1962, there was a border battle on both sides.
