C hina has launched a broadside against India and come down heavily on the approval given by the Asian Development Bank for a loan for Arunachal Pradesh.
Reuters and Chinese news agency Xinhua have reported the Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman to have said, “The ADB, regardless of China’s grave concerns, adopted the Country Partnership Strategy for India (2009-2012), which involves disputed areas between China and India. China is strongly dissatisfied with it.”
Qin Gang also said the approval cannot ‘can not change the existence of the China-Indian territorial disputes, nor China’s position on this issue’.
According to Xinhua Qin Gang also ‘urged the ADB not to intervene in the political affairs of its members’, that ‘adopting such a document seriously damaged the reputation of the ADB and undermined the interests of its members’ and also reportedly said,”The Chinese government strongly demands that the ADB take effective measures to eliminate the impact,” he said.
China had earlier blocked the ADB loan for Arunachal Pradesh, which India had recently managed to push through with support from the US, Japan and South Korea.
The proposed loan is worth US $ 60 million. China has launched the diplomatic counter after statements by Indian officials about substantial increase in the number of troops in Arunachal Pradesh as well as the increasing threat perception from China and the stationing of Indian Air Force (IAF) Sukhoi-30 MKI aircraft at Tezpur earlier this week.
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