China has not given reason for intrusion,says Salman Khurshid
Khurshid says there is 'appreciation of the manner in which India responded'.
India and China on Thursday reviewed the fallout of the recent stand-off in Depsang Valley in Ladakh with External Affairs Minister Salman Khurshid seeking to make existing mechanisms more effective to respond with greater urgency in dealing with border violations.
China,however,has not given any reason why its troops intruded 19 km into Indian territory,Khurshid said.
The three-week stand-off figured prominently in talks between Khurshid and his Chinese counterpart Wang Yi with both expressing satisfaction on its resolution.
We discussed recent episode on the border on the Line of Actual Control. I think it is very refreshing to get from them Chinese very positive and meaningful response, Khurshid,whose visit was under a cloud earlier because of the border row,told the Indian media here after his two hour-long talks.
He said there was appreciation of the manner in which India responded and persuaded and moved in a manner the solution was found.
Ultimately the mechanism did deliver. And also to be able to get data from this experience of what more can be done to make the mechanism more effective and to be able to respond with greater urgency than what we are able to this time in 20 days, he said.
Asked whether there was any degree of clarity on why Chinese troops intruded,Khurshid said,Frankly,I did not even look for it. We are not ready with our analysis. How we responded is clear to us. It is not clear why it happened. They were not offering that background and we were not asking for it at this stage.
To a question on whether China admitted to provocation,Khurshid said,You cannot expect any country to say we provoked. It happened in remote area. To get the message to government it is a long haul. It will take little time to analyse.
He said it was not helpful at this stage to actually apportion blame between them and us. I think we explained very clearly status quo as it existed before April 15…That is what our objective was, he said.
On whether China has given any assurance,he said,I dont think it is fair to ask for assurances…We already have agreements to address this kind of issues.
Wang Yi told Khurshid that China is willing to work with India to advance border negotiations to seek a fair and reasonable solution. China wishes to jointly maintain peace and tranquility along the borders before a settlement,Wang was quoted as saying by the official Xinhua news agency.
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