Sino-Indian glacier research pact stalled
Refusal by China and India to throw open their sensitive border region to each other's scientists has aborted the signing of an agreement for joint research into the melting of Himalayan glaciers.
Research organisations from both countries were scheduled to sign a landmark agreement for monitoring glaciers on Thursday in Beijing in the presence of Indian Environment Minister Jairam Ramesh.
The venue and the time for signing the agreement were announced and media invitations issued, but the ceremony was suddenly cancelled, according to officials who spoke to Indian media.
Neither side has officially divulged the reason for the cancellation. But The Times of India quoted Mr Ramesh as saying it was because of a Chinese demand for more time to study the proposed agreement.
After the fiasco, Mr Ramesh announced that scientists and officials of the two countries would meet in New Delhi in October to try to resolve differences over monitoring glaciers in the strategically sensitive region.
A senior Indian official said 'last minute' security concerns thwarted an agreement despite both sides approving the draft.
Reflecting lingering suspicions, the official quoted Mr Ramesh saying behind closed doors: 'India wants collaborative research into Himalayan glaciers. But we will not allow Chinese scientists to climb all over India's glaciers.'
The glaciers are in a region over which China and India fought a war in 1962. The territorial dispute is yet to be resolved despite 13 rounds of talks since former Indian prime minister Atal Behari Vajpayee's groundbreaking visit to China in 2003.
The disputed Himalayan region supplies water to the world's two most populous nations. Seven of the world's greatest rivers, including the Ganges and the Yangtze, are fed by glaciers straddling China and India. They supply water to about 40 per cent of the world's population.
Figures from the Zurich-based World Glacier Monitoring Service reveal an acceleration in the melting of Himalayan glaciers, nudging China and India to investigate them jointly.
India has ordered its Space Research Organisation and the Science and Technology Ministry to undertake extensive glacial surveys across the eastern and western Himalayas.
China and India failed earlier this month to reach an agreement to save tigers from extinction. When India sought China's co-operation during talks to check the highly lucrative illegal trade in tiger parts, Beijing raised the issue of endangered Tibetan antelopes that are poached for shahtoosh shawls made in India.
'The Chinese feel the same about Tibetan antelopes as we do about tigers,' an Indian official said.
