Conflict

China builds village in India’s Arunachal Pradesh, satellite images show

New Delhi: As shown by the satellite images, China has yet again occupied the Indian land and constructed a new village in Arunachal Pradesh, a state in India sharing borders with Bhutan in the west, Myanmar in the east, and a disputed border with China in the north at the McMahon Line. The village, according to reports, consists of about 101 homes.

The construction, approximately 4.5 kilometres within Indian territory of the border, will be of huge concern to India, the images, dated November 1, 2020, analysed by several experts approached by a Delhi-based news organisation NDTV confirmed.

The village, located on the banks of the River Tsari Chu, lies in the Upper Subansiri district, an area which has been long disputed by India and China and has been marked by armed conflict, the report said.

The report said that the village was constructed in the eastern range of the Himalayas even as Indian and Chinese soldiers confronted each other in their deadliest clash in decades, thousands of kilometres away in the Western Himalayas in Ladakh. The latest image that establishes the village in question is dated November 1, 2020. The image dated a little more than a year before that – August 26, 2019 – does not show any construction activity. So, the village was set up in the last year, it said.

In response to NDTV’s detailed questions, the government of India said it remains committed to improving border infrastructure. ”Our Government too has stepped up border infrastructure including the construction of roads, bridges etc, which has provided much-needed connectivity to the local population along the border.”

In October last year, China’s Foreign Ministry spokesperson said, “For some time, the Indian side has been ramping up infrastructure development along the border and stepping up a military deployment that is the root cause for the tensions between the two sides.” There are, however, no signs of Indian road or infrastructure development in the immediate vicinity of the new Chinese village.

The stand-off in Ladakh continues through this winter with thousands of armed forces personnel from both sides deployed on the frontline at extreme altitudes in sub-zero temperatures. Tensions peaked in June when 20 Indian armed forces personnel were killed in the line of duty in a clash with the Chinese at Galwan Valley.

 

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