India: Chinese army squatting in Arunachal Pradesh
Tibetan spiritual leader the Dalai Lama looks on during a gathering at Yid-Gha-Choezin in Tawang, in the northwestern corner of Arunachal Pradesh state on November 11, 2009. The Dalai Lama said religious “duty” compelled him to make his visit to a Buddhist region near India’s disputed Himalayan border with Tibet that has infuriated China.
The Chinese army has been squatting in the disputed territory of Arunachal Pradesh for 26 years, occupying a strategic location within easy striking distance of the world's second-largest Tibetan monastery, in Tawang.
According to a report in India's Hindustan Times newspaper, the Chinese army took a 28 square kilometer area of Indian territory in 1986, and subsequently Indian politicians have denied the Indian military permission to evict the intruders.
Notably, China claims the entire area as its own, calling it "South Tibet," and has not offered any significant concessions in years of negotiations over the disputed borders of Arunachal Pradesh and Kashmir.