China proposes to expand railway in Aksai Chin region
Snow-covered mountain range is seen from a passenger airplane in Ladakh region September 14, 2020
After India expedited the construction of four "strategic lines" of railways near its disputed boundary with China, the Beijing-controlled Tibet Autonomous Region Development and Reform Commission revealed that the expansion of railway network will be expanded by 2,641 km by 2025 which will pass through the contentious Aksai Chin region close to the Line of Actual Control with India.
The 38,000 sq. km area in India's north, part of the Indian Union Territory of Jammu and Kashmir, remains under illegal Chinese occupation partly since 1950s and completely since 1962.
The development comes as India and China remain locked in an evolving military standoff across the Line of Actual Control (LAC) in eastern Ladakh (region with contiguous boundary with Aksai Chin), since June 2020.
India does not consider its current boundaries with China as a typical international "border". The unresolved international boundary, with roots in imperial British cartographic blunders, is called Line of Actual Control in India's north and McMahon Line in the northeast, named after a British administrator Henry McMahon who led the effort to finalise the boundary question with the then-Chinese rulers in 1914.
"By 2025, the construction of several railway projects, including the Ya’an-Nyingchi section of the Sichuan-Tibet Railway, the Shigatse-Pakhuktso section of the Xinjiang-Tibet Railway, and the Bomi-Ra’uk section of the Yunnan-Tibet Railway will all see major progress," a report by Tibet Autonomous Region Development was quoted as saying by The Indian Express.
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The Shigatse-Pakhuktso section of the proposed Xinjiang-Tibet Railway line will pass through Aksai Chin.
Chinese railway expansion near the LAC: Response to India's "strategic lines"?
India has expedited its efforts in constructing strategic railway lines near the Line of Actual Control with China and has already released the detailed project reports (DPR) of these lines. New Delhi will have a total railway network of about 1,352 km near the Line of Actual Control (in the country's north) and the McMahon Line (in the country's northeast) it shares with China. New Delhi has unveiled four proposed railway lines, three in the Northeast and one in the North.
India's proposed Bhanupli-Bilaspur-Manali-Leh line, once opened, will be the world's highest railway line, overtaking China's Qinghai-Tibet line.
The other three railway lines are links to the border in the northeastern state of Arunachal Pradesh: Missamari-Tenga-Tawang (378 km); Pasighat-Tezu-Rupai (227 km); North Lakhimpur-Bame-Silapathar (249 km).
India's position on Aksai Chin
On August 4th 2019, when Indian parliament did away with Article 370 of Indian constitution which gave Jammu and Kashmir a special status -- the Union Territory whose Aksai Chin is a part -- India's home minister Amit Shah while moving a parliamentary resolution laid out country's position on the status of Aksai Chin.
"When I say Jammu and Kashmir, I include Pakistan Occupied Kashmir and Aksai Chin, both are included in the territorial boundaries of Jammu and Kashmir," Amit Shah said.
A 1962 Indian parliamentary resolution asserted New Delhi's "firm resolve to drive out the aggressor from the sacred soil of India", while referring to the Chinese illegal occupation of Aksai Chin after the 1962 India-China war.
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