In provocative edit, China calls Sushma Swaraj ‘liar’

New Delhi: In another highly provocative move, the Chinese language edition of the Communist Party-run Global Times on Friday accused external affairs minister Sushma Swaraj of lying in her statements on the Doklam stand-off. It also snubbed her suggestion of a simultaneous withdrawal in the disputed region describing it as India’s “fantasy”. The editorial also hinted that New Delhi had become nervous over the stand-off. It threatened military action and maintained that the capabilities of the Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) was far superior to that of the Indian Army. “India’s current number of soldiers may be higher, but they do not know the PLA’s strong delivery capacity can change the number of forces within a day. China also has a long-range strike capability. China and India’s military spending scale is four to one, and our GDP is five times larger than India’s. Such a gap in strength will shape the actual outcome on the border,” it said. While refusing to recognise the Bhutanese authority over Doklam and India’s locus standi, the editorial said, “Not one inch of Chinese land can be lost.”

Ms Swaraj had said in Parliament on Thursday, “Their (China’s) intention was to reach the tri-junction so that they can unilaterally end the status of the tri-junction. It was only then that India came into the picture. If China unilaterally changes the tri-junction point, then India’s security is challenged ... India’s position is not wrong on the tri-junction and all nations are with it. The law is with our country.” 

Indian and Chinese troops have been locked in a face-off in the Doklam area of Bhutan for over a month after Indian troops stopped the Chinese PLA from building a road in Bhutanese territory which China covets.

According to news and website reports from Beijing, the editorial stated, “The lady foreign minister was lying to the parliamentarians in India, because firstly, India invaded the territory of China and it is a fact that New Delhi’s adventures made the international community surprised that no country would support it. Secondly, India’s military power is far behind China, and once things go to a military solution, there is no doubt India will lose.” It added, “If New Delhi does not withdraw its troops, the last option for China is fighting against India and ending the conflict without diplomatic means.”

It further said: “We noticed that the tone of the statement by India has been fractionally changed. They started to claim that Donglong (Doklam) is a trijunction and have presented the proposition of withdrawing the troops of both sides to feel out China’s response. It reflects that New Delhi has begun to be diffident.”

It went on to say that if India still holds on to its “confrontational attitude”, they should be prepared to bear the consequences of the escalation of the conflict. “The logistics and manoeuvrability of the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) is far superior to that of India.” The editorial asked India to “abandon the long-term fantasy” of the Doklam area. “China will never engage with what India calls ‘double withdrawal’. Confrontation is in the territory of China, and India must unilaterally withdraw,” it said, adding that the Chinese government would never allow China’s public sentiment to be violated. “China cherishes peace. But peace cannot be achieved at the expense of China’s lost territory, and 1.4 billion Chinese people will not accept that peace,” it said. 

Claiming that India would not receive support from the United States or Japan in the event of a conflict — in the wake of the recent Malabar exercises — the editorial said, “Their support is virtual,” adding, “If India imagines it has a strategic card in the Indian Ocean, then it is being naive. China has a lot of cards than can hurt India’s soft underbelly.” On what happened during the 1962 Sino-Indian war, the editorial said India had then made “a wrong assessment” of “China’s determination to defend territory”. “We hope this time New Delhi does not repeat the same mistake,” it concluded.

Further, according to other reports from Beijing, former Chinese consulate general in Mumbai Liu Youfa was quoted as telling an English TV channel in China that Indian troops in Doklam have three options. “First, they can go out voluntarily, or they may be captured, or when the border dispute should escalate, they may be killed.”