China developing area along disputed border with Bhutan
By James Griffiths and Manveena Suri in CNN
Hong Kong (CNN)New satellite images appear to show China has built up an area in the Himalayas along a disputed border with India and Bhutan that was the site of a months-long standoff in 2017.
According to US-based satellite operator Maxar Technologies, the images, dated October 28, 2020, show “there has clearly been significant construction activity this year all along the Torsa River valley area.” In a statement, Maxar added there had also been construction of “new military storage bunkers” near the Doklam area.
Maxar said the images show the newly constructed Pangda Village, on the Bhutanese side of the disputed border, as well as a supply depot in Chinese territory, near the point of a tense dispute between Indian and Chinese forces in 2017.
In a statement, Bhutan’s ambassador to India, Major General Vetsop Namgyel, said “there is no Chinese village inside Bhutan.”
China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs said that “China’s normal construction activities on its own territory are entirely within the scope of China’s sovereignty, and there is nothing wrong with it.” India’s Ministry of External Affairs did not respond to a request for comment.
Indian broadcaster NDTV first reported the satellite images.
A thin strip of land bordering all three countries, the Doklam area is claimed by both China and Bhutan, but it is also strategically important to India, because of its proximity to the Siliguri Corridor, a vital artery between New Delhi and its north eastern states.
“The Siliguri Corridor is strategically important and highly sensitive territory, as it remains the only bridge between the eight north-eastern states of India and the rest of the country,” analyst Syed Fazl-e-Haider wrote earlier this year in an article published by Australian think tank, The Lowy Institute . “By an advance of just 130 kilometers (80 miles), the Chinese military could cut off Bhutan, west Bengal and the north-eastern states of India. About 50 million people in north-east India would be separated from the country.”
In an article in the state-run Global Times newspaper Monday, Chinese experts were quoted refuting Maxar’s claims and reports in Indian media that a village had been built in Bhutanese territory.