News Brief
After Flattening Terror Bases In Pakistan, India Rips Into China’s Name-Change Gimmicks In Arunachal
MEA spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal
India has firmly rejected China's latest move to rename locations in Arunachal Pradesh, which Beijing labels as "Zangnan"—the so-called southern part of Tibet.
This comes days after India on 7 May launched military strikes on terror infrastructure in China's "all-weather ally" Pakistan in response to the Pahalgam terror attack in which 26 people, mostly tourists, were killed by Pakistan-backed terrorists on 22 April.
In response to a new batch of Chinese name changes, the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) dismissed the effort as futile and reiterated India's stance on the status of the state.
"We have noticed that China has persisted with its vain and preposterous attempts to name places in the Indian state of Arunachal Pradesh," MEA spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal stated on Wednesday (14 May).
"Consistent with our principled position, we reject such attempts categorically. Creative naming will not alter the undeniable reality that Arunachal Pradesh was, is, and will always remain an integral and inalienable part of India," Jaiswal said in the statement.
China, which continues to lay claim to Arunachal Pradesh, has a history of issuing maps that rename several locations within the Indian state.
China had previously released three lists of standardised names for places in Arunachal Pradesh, with the first list of six places issued in 2017, followed by a list of 15 places in 2021, and another list of 11 places in 2023.
India had categorically rejected them too.
The territorial dispute over Arunachal Pradesh remains one of the enduring sources of tension between India and China.
Sharing a border with Tibet Autonomous Region, Arunachal Pradesh is claimed by Beijing as part of historical Tibet.
However, New Delhi has governed the region as an integral part of India since 1947 and its post-independence consolidation of Northeastern region.
