Top govt panel reviews Ladakh situation, 6th round of military talks in the offing

New Delhi: A high-powered government panel on China on Friday reviewed the latest developments in eastern Ladakh, focusing on charting out the course of future negotiations to restore status quo ante of mid-April along the contested Line of Actual Control (LAC), officials familiar with the developments were quoted as saying.

The officials said the agenda for the next of round military talks between Indian and Chinese corps commander-ranked officers — expected to take place shortly — was discussed at the high-level meeting attended by Defence minister Rajnath Singh, National Security Adviser Ajit Doval, Chief of Defence Staff General Bipin Rawat, Army Chief General Manoj Mukund Naravane and other top officials.

The meeting took place a day after Singh told Parliament that no force in the world can stop the Indian Army from patrolling borders, signalling a resolve to regain access to several areas that are now difficult to reach due to actions by the Chinese army along the LAC.

According to a report, the corps commander-ranked officers could meet in the next few days to take the military talks forward, the officials said.

Corps commander-ranked officers have so far met five times but failed to break the deadlock.

Another report mentions that there are at least 10 patrolling points along the LAC in eastern Ladakh that have been blocked by Chinese troops. The Patrolling Points (PPs) are the endpoints along the undefined LAC, up to which the Indian troops patrol after starting from their respective base camps.

As per the disengagement plan agreed between the corps commanders of India and China on June 30, the two sides agreed to pull back from all the friction points and decided that "depth areas" such as the Depsang plains in the north, where China has amassed troops, will be looked into. However, so far the Chinese transgression at Depsang has not been discussed.

With agency inputs