Japan says Indian road project not in China-contested territory
November 18, 2014, 12:56 pm

China and India signed a landmark border accord last year [Xinhua]

Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Hong Lei made the remarks at a press briefing when asked about a recent report that said Japan International Corp. Agency (JICA) had a contract to build roads on the China-India border.

According to a November 4 report by Indian magazine Legal Era, India has agreed to give JICA about 2,000 kilometers of road along the Chinese border. JICA will provide financial assistance and technical expertise to the road project.

“We […] inquired about the project,” said Hong. “Japan clarified that its cooperation with India was not in the disputed border area.”

India and China have taken positive measures in maintaining peace and stability on the border in recent years, and signed a landmark border accord last year.

China and India share a 2,000-km-long border that has never been formally delineated. The two countries began discussing border issues in the 1980s.

China has earlier opposed the Asian Development Bank’s (ADB) plans to extend assistance in the region stating that it was a disputed area.

The Chinese Foreign Ministry in recent weeks raised concerns over plans announced by India to establish 54 new border posts stating that pending final settlement of the boundary question, India should refrain from taking any action that may complicate it.

Early this year, the new Indian government has invited Japan to assist improving the infrastructure in North East areas. Japanese Minister for Land, Infrastructure and Tourism Akihiro Ohta during his visit to New Delhi in September this year also offered to assist India in building infrastructure in the North Eastern Indian states, bordering China.

Strains on ties between Tokyo and Beijing were lifted symbolically when Chinese President Xi Jinping met Japanese Premier Shinzo Abe in Beijing this month.

Analysts say among major foreign policy challenges faced by the new Indian government formed by the Bharatiya Janata Party would be to strike a balance between its overtures to Tokyo and the consolidation of growing goodwill with Beijing.

“The love triangle featuring Japan, China and India is being watched with keen interest by the West even as the US pivots to Asia,” Saeed Naqvi, Indian journalist and foreign policy expert told The BRICS Post.

The personal friendship shared by the new Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Japanese Premier Shinzo Abe, reported extensively by Indian media, is a development closely watched by China.

“Both as new emerging countries and members of BRICS, China and India have plenty of interests in common. If Japan attempts to form a united front centered on India, it will be a crazy fantasy generated by Tokyo’s anxiety of facing a rising Beijing,” said an editorial in China’s Communist Party run Global Times.

 TBP and Agencies