India rejects China's fresh allegations, hits out at Beijing for 'provocative behaviour' to alter status quo

Responding to the same, Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) Spokesperson Arindam Bagchi said such allegations had no basis in facts, and added that it was China's amassing of a large number of troops on the border and their provocative behaviour and unilateral attempts to alter status quo that led to the deadly skirmish last year.

“We had already made our position clear a few days back that we reject such statements which have no basis in facts,” the Ministry of External Affairs spokesperson Arindam Bagchi said.

“It was the amassing of large number of troops by the Chinese side, their provocative behaviour and unilateral attempts to alter status quo in contravention of all our bilateral agreements that resulted in serious disturbance of peace and tranquility along the LAC in Eastern Ladakh,” he said.

“China continues to deploy large number of troops and armaments in the border areas. It was in response to Chinese actions, that our armed forces had to make appropriate counter deployments in these areas to ensure that India’s security interests are fully protected.

“As emphasized by EAM in his meeting with Chinese FM earlier this month, it is our expectation that the Chinese side will work towards early resolution of the remaining issues along the LAC in Eastern Ladakh while fully abiding by bilateral agreements and protocols,” he said.

The response was to the Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Hua Chunying saying on Wednesday that India has “long pursued a ‘forward policy’ and illegally crossed the LAC to encroach on China’s territory, which is the root cause of the China-India border tension. China opposes any arms race in the disputed border areas for the purpose of competition over control,” she said.

On Sept 24 too, India had rejected China’s attempts to put the blame for the Galwan Valley incident of last year on New Delhi.

In February, both India and China completed the withdrawal of troops and weapons from the north and south banks of the Pangong lake in line with a disengagement agreement.

[With UNI inputs]