‘Don’t wish to see more clashes with India’, says China

After Monday’s violent face-off between Chinese and Indian troops in the Galwan valley in eastern Ladakh area, China on Wednesday said that it does not wish to see “more clashes” with India.

“From the Chinese side, we do not wish to see more clashes,” said Zhao Lijian, Chinese Foreign Ministry Spokesperson on Galwan valley clash, which caused causalities on both sides.

“We are having communication through diplomatic and military channels. The right and wrong of this is very clear… The incident happened on the Chinese side of Line of Actual Control (LAC) and China is not to blame for it,” Lijian added.

Beijing even went on to claim the sovereignty over the Galwan valley area and accused India of violating border protocols.

“The sovereignty of the Galwan valley area has always belonged to China. The Indian border troops flip-flopped and seriously violated our border protocols on border-related issues and the consensus of our commander level talks,” Lijian said.

He further asked India to “strictly discipline its frontline troops, stop infringing and provocative activity at once and work with China and come back to the right track of resolving the differences through dialogue and talk.”

On Tuesday, External Affairs Ministry spokesperson Anurag Srivastava had said that violent face-off happened on late evening and night of June 15 in the Galwan valley was caused by Chinese troops’ attempt to “unilaterally change” the status quo during de-escalation and the situation could have been avoided if the agreement at the higher level been scrupulously followed by the Chinese side.

Srivastava had said both sides suffered casualties in the violent face-off and the Chinese side departed from the consensus to respect the LAC in the Galwan valley.

Responding to media queries on the situation in the western sector of the India-China border, Srivastava had said that India and China have been discussing through military and diplomatic channels the de-escalation of the situation in the border area in Eastern Ladakh. (ANI)