China says progress is being made in India border talks, but New Delhi warns of stalemate

Name: Who has the upper hand in the India-China border dispute?
Uploaded: 2022-07-22T13:32:02.000Z
Duration: 6 min 15 s
Description: Who has the upper hand in the India-China border dispute?

A joint statement following talks on Sunday said the discussions had been ‘constructive and forward-looking’

Some Indian media reports say China’s refusal to discuss disengagement alone some areas of their disputed frontier had caused progress to stall

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Indian army vehicles on a highway in Ladkh. Photo: EPA-EFE

Amber Wang

Published: 9:32pm, 22 Jul 2022

China and India are making progress in their border talks and are discussing ways to calm tensions, according to Chinese state media.

At least one side put forward proposals that were discussed during the latest round of military talks last Sunday, Yuyuan Tantian, a social media account affiliated with state broadcaster CCTV reported on Thursday, citing an anonymous source.

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Who has the upper hand in the India-China border dispute?

For the first time both sides said in a joint statement after the talks over the western sector of the Line of Actual Control, the de facto border, that they had continued discussions in a “constructive and forward-looking manner”.

But Indian media reports have said there is stalemate between the two sides and that New Delhi was frustrated by China’s refusal to discuss a broader disengagement rather than specific flashpoints.

The talks were held four months after the two sides last met – the longest gap so far between the 16 rounds of commander-level talks following a deadly clash in the Galwan Valley in Ladakh in June 2020.

This year relations between the two countries have shown signs of improvement after years of tension following the Galwan clash and an earlier stand-off on the Bhutan border in 2017.