Leigh, India (Reuters) – Two Indian officials say Chinese troops are laying a network of fiber optic cables with India at a flash point in the western Himalayas, indicating they are digging for long distances despite high-level talks aimed at resolving the stalemate there. Is.
Such cables, which will provide troops providing a secret line of security at the base at the rear, were recently found south of Pangong Tso Lake in the Himalayan region of Ladakh, a senior government official said.
Thousands of Indian and Chinese troops, backed by tanks and planes, are stranded in a restless impasse on the 70-km-long front to the south of the lake.
The two sides have accused each other of escalating a very serious confrontation on the border between nuclear-armed neighbors over the decades.
A third Indian official said on Monday that no special withdrawals or reinforcements had been made by the two countries since their foreign ministers met last week.
“It’s as tense as ever,” he said.
A Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman has expressed doubts about the cable network’s report.
“As far as I know, the relevant report is not true,” spokesman Wang Wenbin said on Tuesday.
China and India will be in touch through diplomatic and military channels, ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin said at a news briefing in Beijing.
China’s defense officials could not immediately be reached for comment.
In June, 20 Indian soldiers were killed fighting alongside Chinese troops in the area. Both sides agreed to withdraw after the clash, but the Indian military has accused Chinese forces of violating the agreement.
Security conversation
Above Leh, the main city of Ladakh, Indian fighter jets flew early Monday morning, their engines roaring and roaring in a valley surrounded by brown, barren mountains.
“Our biggest concern is that they have laid optical fiber cables for high-speed communications,” the first official said, referring to the south bank of the lake where Indian and Chinese troops are only a hundred meters apart on some issues.
“They’re laying optical fiber cables along the south coast at breakneck speeds,” he said.
Indian intelligence agencies noticed similar cables north of Pangong Tso Lake about a month ago, another government official said.
The first Indian official said authorities were alerted to the activity when unusual lines appeared in the satellite image in the desert sands of the satellite elevation south of Pengong Tso.
Lines backed by Indian experts – and supported by foreign intelligence agencies – were made up of communication cables laid in trenches, he said, near the Spanggur Gap, on the hills where troops fired into the air for the first time in decades.
Indian officials say their side is also likely to have taken part in the conflict over border infrastructure.
The Chinese have complained about the construction of roads and airstrips in the area in India, and Beijing says this has caused tensions.
The former Indian military intelligence officer, who declined to be identified due to the sensitivity of the matter, said fiber optic cables provide communication security as well as the ability to send data such as pictures and documents.
“If you talk on the radio, he can be caught. Communication on optical fiber cables is secure, ”he said.
The Indian military is still dependent on radio communications, however, the first official said, although he said it was encrypted.
Reported by Devjyot Ghoshal; Additional reporting by Gabriel Crosley and Yu Lun Tian; Edited by Hugh Law Sun.
.
