In further development on the Indo-China border conflict, external affairs minister S Jaishankar met with his counterpart Wang Yi in Moscow in an attempt to defuse tension after a spike in conflicts along the Line of Actual Control.
The meet between the foreign ministers took place on the sidelines of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation which is taking place in Moscow, Russia.
Both India and China are in regular touch through military and diplomatic channels to resolve the situation. This was also the consensus when the two defence ministers met
Anurag Srivastava, Ministry of External Affairs
The talks by foreign minister of the two countries comes after a fresh stand-off at the southern bank of Pangong Tso earlier this week. Chinese soldiers were reportedly armed with spears and rifles when they approached the Indian forward posts and shots were fired for the first time along the LAC in 45 years. This fight was on the same lines of the clash that took place on June 14 at Galwan Valley, killing 20 Indian soldiers.
Indian Army said that the Chinese soldiers who were forced to retreat, fired shots in the air. China claimed that Indian soldiers fired warning shots after ‘crossing the LAC’, which the Indian army denied.
Troops from both India and China have patrolled this region for decades, as the 2,200-mile border is a long-standing subject of competing claims and tensions, including a brief war in 1962.
The Line of Actual Control is not demarcated and both the countries have different ideas of where it should be located, leading to regular conflicts. Often, these tensions do not escalate, but, the latest ‘transgression’ is the fifth conflict since 2013.
Despite long-standing border tensions, the two giants have significant multilateral cooperation, including through alternate global institutions created over the past decade. But, India after the June 15 conflict with China conducted a ‘digital surgical strike’ on China and banned over 250 Chinese apps including the famous gaming app, PubG.