SOURCE: TIMES NOW
The Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) has suffered medical casualties in the North Bank area of Pangong Tso. Cases of casualty evacuation have been spotted in the area over the last week.
The weather in the area, which is considerably below the freezing point in the nights, may be the reason for increasing PLA casualties. Around 5,000 Chinese soldiers are occupying the peaks at an altitude of 15,000-16,000 feet.
Notably, Beijing had recently said that it does not recognise Union Territory (UT) status granted by New Delhi to Ladakh three days after US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo revealed that China has deployed 60,000 soldiers along the Line of Actual Control (LAC) against India.
Zhao Lijian, the spokesman for China’s foreign ministry, told the media that Beijing opposes India building infrastructure in the region. India has built 44 new bridges India has built near the LAC with China in Ladakh and Arunachal Pradesh, which were inaugurated recently.
“First I want to make it clear that China does not recognise the Ladakh Union Territory illegally set up by the Indian side and Arunachal Pradesh. We stand against the development of infrastructure facilities aimed at military contention along the border areas,” Lijian told the media.
“Based on consensus, neither should take actions along the border that might escalate the situation that is to avoid undermining the efforts by the two sides to ease the situation,” he added.
On Friday, Pompeo had said, “The Indians are seeing 60,000 Chinese soldiers on their northern border”, adding that each of the three major Indo-Pacific democracies — India, Australia and Japan — are under threat from the Chinese Communist Party, news agency IANS reported.
Indian and Chinese troops have been locked in a face-off in eastern Ladakh since May. In June, 20 Indian soldiers and an unknown number of Chinese troops were killed in a bloody clash in the Galwan Valley.
