New Delhi, April 3: China is incorrigible. It has been proved beyond doubt. Every move of China is deceptive. “One step forward – Two steps backward” seems to be the norm in India-China relations.
As a fresh and new flash-point between India and China, the dragon country has released a map that contains 11 names of various places in Arunachal Pradesh. “These places belong to us,” China says boldly in one of its official website.
The new map released by China depicts these 11 places as parts of Southern Tibet which China refers to as Zangman. It also includes an area close to Arunachal Pradesh capital Itanagar. The appended list released by China include names in Mandarin, Tibetan and Pinyin (English transliteration) of the 11 places along with the exact Latitude and Longitude coordinates.
This time China has included five mountain peaks, two residential areas, two land areas and two rivers. It is a totally different matter that China lacks locus standi in any of these locations. This is the third time that China has highlighted such a list attempting to rename places calling them “standardized geographical names”
The Indian Ministry of External Affairs did not respond to requests for a comment on the announcement from Beijing but has rejected similar renaming and standardization attempts in the past.
“Arunachal Pradesh has always been and will be always be an integral part of India. Assigning invented names to places in Arunachal Pradesh does not alter this fact on the ground,” spokesperson Arindam Bagchi had said in 2021.
In 2021, the Chinese Ministry of Civilian affairs had published a similar renamed list of six places and 15 places in 2021. The second list had come after standoff between Indian Army and PLA forces began in April 2020 along the LAC. The April 2 announcement – the third list – comes ahead of a visit to India this month by China’s newly appointed Defence Minister General Li Shangfu, who is expected to attend the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) defence ministers’ meeting and a visit by Chinese foreign minister Qin Gang, who will attend SCO foreign ministers meeting in May at Goa.
New Delhi has, multiple times, previously dismissed the Chinese move to rename places in its border territories.
EOM.
