A policeman looks at trucks stranded on the Jammu-Srinagar highway in Nagrota, near Jammu on Friday, following a security lockdown in the region after the Indian government stripped Jammu and Kashmir of their autonomy. Photo: VCG

Chinese State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi met Indian External Affairs Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar in Beijing on Monday, during which the Indian diplomat pledged that India's constitutional amendment won't create new sovereignty claims and won't change the Line of Control (LoC) in the Kashmir region.

The talk came after India's controversial move on August 5 to scrap the special status to Indian-controlled Kashmir.

China opposes any unilateral action that complicates the regional situation, and hopes India and Pakistan can resolve the disputes through peaceful methods, Wang said in a statement released by Chinese foreign ministry on Monday. 

Wang said China is concerned about the current Kashmir situation and the escalating India-Pakistan conflict. India's move to end the constitutional status of Jammu Kashmir will change the status quo of the disputed area and result in regional tensions, he added.

Wang also said the Indian government's announcement of the establishment of the Ladakh Union Territory, which involves Chinese territory, has posed a challenge to China's sovereignty and violated the two countries' agreement on maintaining peace and stability in the border region. 

India's move is neither valid to China nor will change the status quo that China exercises sovereignty and administrative jurisdiction over the territories involved, Wang stressed. 

Jaishankar expressed India's stance, noting that India's constitutional amendment won't create new sovereignty claims, won't change the LoC in the Kashmir region and won't change the control line on the China-India border, the statement said.  

India hopes to improve relations with Pakistan, and remain restrained and safeguard regional peace and stability. India also wishes to continue resolving border issues with China and stick to the consensus between the two countries on maintaining peace in the border region, Jaishankar was quoted in the statement as saying. 

Although the India diplomat's visit was predetermined, many observers called it an "emergency visit" because it came after Pakistani Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi made a special emergency visit to China Friday evening and briefed Wang on Pakistan's views, position and countermeasures on Kashmir.

China believes any unilateral action that may complicate the situation in Kashmir should not be taken, Wang said at the meeting. 

Chinese observers also pointed out that India's move was reckless. They noted that Kashmir is a powder keg filled with territorial disputes and ethnic and regional conflicts.  They added that the situation is not India's "internal affairs."

New Delhi's unilateral decision will bite India back in the future, warned Chinese experts.

Scraping Kashmir's special status is just a carnival of nationalism. If the Indian government continues hyping this mood, it will become more and more radical and will surely backfire, said Zhao Gancheng, director of the Center for Asia-Pacific Studies at the Shanghai Institute for International Studies.

A radical and nationalistic India won't be embraced by Asia, Zhao told the Global Times. 

India's rise needs a peaceful neighborhood, and provoking Pakistan is not a good way to solve it, said Zhao.

Global Times


Newspaper headline: India vows charter amendment won’t change Kashmir LoC