Earlier, the Reuters news agency reported that two Indian officials had said that Chinese troops were laying fiber optic cables south of Pangong Lake in Ladakh (Image for representation)
Earlier, a Reuters report quoted a senior government official as saying that such cables would provide advanced troops with secure lines of communication with bases in the area.
- News18.com
- Last update: September 15, 2020 4:52 PM IST
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China’s Foreign Ministry on Tuesday denied reports that Chinese troops are installing a network of fiber optic cables in Ladakh’s flash point. China and India will remain in communication through diplomatic and military channels, Foreign Ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin was quoted as saying by Reuters.
Previously, the news agency reported that two Indian officials had said that Chinese troops were laying fiber-optic cables south of Pangong Lake in Ladakh, even as high-level talks were taking place to resolve a clash there. A senior government official was quoted as saying that such cables would provide advanced troops with secure lines of communication with bases in the area. Another official said there have been no significant withdrawals or reinforcements from either side since the foreign ministers of the two countries met last week. “He’s just as tense as before,” he added.
“Our biggest concern is that they have laid fiber optic cables for high-speed communications,” the first official said, referring to the southern shore of the lake, where Indian and Chinese troops are only a few hundred meters apart at some points. . “They have been laying fiber optic cables on the southern shore at breakneck speed,” he said.
Indian intelligence agencies had discovered similar cables north of Pangong Tso Lake about a month ago, the second government official said. The first Indian government official said authorities were alerted to such activity after satellite images showed unusual lines in the sand of high-altitude deserts south of Pangong Tso.
These lines were judged by Indian experts, and corroborated by foreign intelligence agencies, as communication cables laid in trenches, he said, even near the Spanggur gap, between the hills where soldiers recently fired into the air for the first time in decades.
Amid reports of Chinese troops laying a network of fiber optic cables in Ladakh, Defense Minister Rajnath Singh will make a statement in Parliament on Tuesday about the continuing clash, sources told News18.
India and China have been embroiled in a tense standoff since April-May over transgressions by the Chinese army in several key areas, including the Finger area, the Galwan Valley, Hot Springs and Kongrung Nala. The situation deteriorated after clashes in the Galwan Valley in June, where twenty Indian soldiers were killed in hand-to-hand combat, an incident that prompted China and India to deploy additional forces along the border.
Earlier this month, a new border clash broke out between Indian and Chinese troops in eastern Ladakh. The Indian army said Chinese troops fired shots in the air and attempted to approach an Indian position in eastern Ladakh as it rejected accusations by the Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) that it transgressed throughout LAC.
(With input from Reuters)
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