Visuals show Chinese army disengagement along LAC
NEW DELHI: Fresh visuals released by the Indian Army on Tuesday showed that disengagement in eastern Ladakh’s Pangong Tso sector is in top gear, with the Chinese People’s Liberation Army soldiers dismantling their bunkers, tented camps and pillboxes, and retreating from barren heights on both banks of the lake to vehicles waiting at the nearest road-heads to carry them back to their bases.
This forms part of the February 10 agreement on disengagement between India and China that makes it binding on the two sides to remove structures they constructed after April 2020 when border tensions began.
The new visuals showed PLA using earth-moving machinery to level structures built by it to support forward deployed troops on heights. Disengagement between rival soldiers deployed on heights on the north and south banks of Pangong Tso began on February 10, and will be completed by the weekend, as previously reported by HT.
The images also captured what the areas looked like before and after the disengagement.
The pictures give an idea of the extent of the deployment, build up and heavy equipment like tanks that were employed in the standoff, said former Northern Army commander Lieutenant General DS Hooda (retd). “I have maintained that the start of the disengagement is a positive step as it separates out the two forces from an eyeball-to-eyeball situation that could trigger some local incident,” Hooda said.
“Both sides have pulled back a large number of their troops deployed on heights on the two banks. Some concrete structures are being dismantled. Disengagement is progressing smoothly...,” officials familiar with the developments said.
Senior commanders of the two armies are likely to meet next week to discuss disengagement at other friction points in eastern Ladakh.