As China on Thursday objected to Home Minister Amit Shah’s visit to Arunachal Pradesh, saying the visit had violated its territorial sovereignty and “sabotaged” mutual trust with India, New Delhi asserted the eastern State is an integral part of the country. Moreover, objection to an Indian Minister’s visit there does not stand to reason, it reiterated.
The Home Minister is in Arunachal Pradesh to attend functions related to the 34th Statehood Day of the northeastern state and launched projects including industry and road infrastructure. China has always claimed the border State as part of south Tibet and routinely criticises the visit of any Indian official to the region.
Objecting to Shah’s visit, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Geng Shuang said “China’s position on the eastern sector of the China-India boundary, or the southern part of China’s Tibet region, is consistent and clear.”
Responding to a question about Shah’s visit, the spokesperson said “the Chinese Government has never recognised the so-called ‘Arunachal Pradesh’ and is firmly opposed to the Indian politician’s visit to the southern part of China’s Tibet region as it violated China’s territorial sovereignty, undermined stability of the border area, sabotaged political mutual trust, and violated relevant bilateral agreement,” Geng. The official also said India should stop taking any action that may “further complicate the border issue.”
Asked about China’s objection to Shah’s visit, Ministry of External Affairs spokesperson Raveesh Kumar said here on Thursday India’s consistent position has been that the State is its integral and inalienable part. Objecting to visit to Arunachal by an Indian leader does not stand to reason, he said.
China last year too raised similar issue when Defence Minister Rajnath Singh visited Arunachal Pradesh to take stock of the security situation in the frontier border region.
Earlier in 2019, customs authorities in a northeastern Chinese city had destroyed nearly 30,000 world maps showing Arunachal Pradesh as a part of India and Taiwan as a separate country.