Accuses India of ‘violent actions’

China on Monday urged India to abide by the Line of Actual Control (LAC) position of 1959, following last week’s scuffle between troops of the two countries along the Pangong lake in Ladakh.

To a question, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Hua Chunying accused Indian troops of undertaking “violent actions” and injuring Chinese personnel.

The Ministry urged India to abide by the “1959 LAC” — an apparent reference to the alignment espoused by former Chinese Premier Zhou en Lai in a letter to Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru. In his 2016 book, Choices: Inside the Making of India’s Foreign Policy, former National Security Adviser Shivshankar Menon points out that in the proposal of November 1959, the Chinese describe the LAC “only in general terms on maps not to scale”. India rejected the proposal in 1959 and 1962.

Zhou en Lai then wrote to Nehru that in the eastern sector, the line “coincides in the main with the so-called McMahon Line, and in the western and middle sectors, it coincides in the main with the traditional customary line which has consistently been pointed out by China”.

Ms. Hua said the incident at Pangong lake had “violated the consensus” on border issues. She said China had expressed “grave dissatisfaction” and lodged its serious concern with India.