After a military meeting between India and China on the border dispute yesterday, Delhi said in a statement on Sunday that the two countries wanted a “peaceful solution” to the crisis.
China’s state-run mouthpiece, the Global Times, reported an army movement today, but members of the air force flew to the Ladakh border just hours from central China’s Hubei province.Indian military sources in Delhi on Sunday indicated that both sides were fairly adamant in their position at the meeting yesterday.
At the same time, Indian military sources have indicated that the dispute over the Ladakh border will not be resolved any time soon.
For more than a month, tensions between India and China have been running high over the deployment of troops in the Galwan Valley and Pangong Lake areas on the Ladakh border.
Military officials from the two countries met on Saturday at the “Border Personnel Meeting Point” in Moldo, inside China, on the Line of Actual Control in eastern Ladakh, after China agreed to a military-level meeting proposed by India to defuse tensions.
India was represented by Lieutenant General Harinder Singh, Commander of the 4th Corps, and China was led by the Commander of the Tibetan Military District.
The meeting took place in a “very cordial atmosphere” and the two sides sought a “peaceful solution”, the Indian foreign ministry said today – but did not say anything about withdrawing troops from the disputed border area.
Many now say that three years ago, Indian and Chinese troops clashed in Doklam, near the Sikkim-Bhutan border, for 72 days – but it would not be a surprise if the ongoing conflict in Ladakh lasted for 162 days or even in winter.
