External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj announced to reporters here that the stand-off between the Indian and Chinese troops in Ladakh had been “resolved”, and that both sides would retreat to their original positions on the Line of Actual Control (LAC) by the end of September.
Swaraj, who spoke on Thursday, ahead of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s arrival in New York, also blamed Islamabad for “spoiling” the scheduled secretary-level talks between the two countries in August.
Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif was scheduled to address the UN General Assembly on Friday, and a top Pakistani official accompanying him told reporters here on Thursday that there was “no reason” for him to not raise the Kashmir issue in his speech.
“I am happy to tell you that both nations (India and China) have sat down and resolved the (LAC standoff) issue. Timelines have been decided,” Swaraj told Indian reporters after a meeting with IBSA (India-Brazil-South Africa) foreign ministers on the sidelines of the UNGA session.
Swaraj said she had met with Chinese Foreign Affairs Minister Wang Yi at the United Nations, and discussed the stand-off with him. Swaraj described the resolution of the matter as a “big accomplishment”.
Troops from the two sides lined up in Chumar in a face-off that began over the weekend, casting, Swaraj said, a “shadow” over the visit of China’s President Xi Jinping to India, which was otherwise “very historical” and saw “very good outcomes”.
Swaraj said the withdrawal of the troops would begin on Friday and, by September 30, both sides would return to their September 1, 2014 positions along the LAC.
“The bad phase will end, and by September 30th, the withdrawal of troops will be completed. I talked about this with the Chinese Foreign Minister. I believe this is a big accomplishment,” Swaraj said. She described her meeting with Wang as “very successful”.
On Pakistan, Swaraj said Islamabad “spoiled the game” by choosing to talk to Kashmiri separatist leaders a week before the scheduled August 25 meeting between Foreign secretaries Sujatha Singh and Aizaz Ahmad Chaudhary in Islamabad. India called off the dialogue on August 18, an hour after Pakistan High Commissioner Abdul Basit met Hurriyat leader Shabir Shah in Delhi.
“New (Narendra Modi) government has given a new signal. So they (Pakistan) spoiled the talks, they spoiled the game,” Swaraj said when asked for a reaction to Pakistan’s National Security and Foreign Affairs Adviser Sartaj Aziz’s remarks earlier on Thursday that since it was India that had cancelled the talks, they could now resume only if New Delhi took the initiative.
“No question of (reaching out) first or second. As far as our reaction is concerned, we have said repeatedly that if a continued…
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