China again blames India for Galwan Valley clash, finally reveals identity of its fallen soldiers

While India has announced the casualties immediately after the incident, China did not officially acknowledge the casualties until Friday

China’s People’s Liberation Army (PLA) on Friday revealed the identities of its four soldiers who were killed in the clash with the Indian Army personnel on the Line of Actual Control (LAC) at Galwan Valley in eastern Ladakh on June 15 last year.

Though the two sides now completed the withdrawal of frontline troops from both banks of Pangong Tso as the first step towards ending the 10-month-long military stand-off along the LAC, China once again blamed India for the violent face-off at Galwan Valley. The Chinese PLA also released a video on the clash with subtitles in English, referring to the Indian Army as “relevant foreign military” and accusing it of violating India-China agreements and trespassing “border line” to build roads and bridges and trying to change the status quo along the ‘border” unilaterally. The video lauded the Chinese PLA officers and soldiers for fighting “bravely” and defeating and expelling the “offenders”, i.e. the Indian Army personnel, from the territory claimed by China.

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“It should be noted that since last June, Indian troops illegally crossed the LAC for deliberate provocation, and even violently attacked the Chinese officers and soldiers who went there for negotiation, thus intentionally triggering the fierce physical conflict at the Galwan Valley and causing casualties on both sides,” Senior Colonel Ren Guoqiang, Spokesman for Chinese Ministry of National Defence, said in Beijing. “The responsibility of the skirmish at the Galwan Valley lies entirely with the Indian side.”

The Indian Army lost 20 of its soldiers, including the Commanding Officer of its 16 Bihar Regiment, Colonel B Santosh Babu, in the clash at Galwan Valley. The Chinese PLA, however, took eight months to reveal the identities of the soldiers it had lost during the violent face-off.

The Indian Army has been blaming the Chinese PLA for the premeditated attack on its personnel.

The Chinese PLA revealed the identities of its fallen men just days after Lt Gen YK Joshi, the General Officer Commanding-in-Chief of the Indian Army’s Northern Command, referred to a report by Russian TASS news agency that had claimed that the communist country had lost 45 of its soldiers in the Galwan Valley clash.

“After the skirmish, the Chinese side, out of consideration to preserve the overall situation of the relations between China and India as well as the two militaries, promoted the cooling and easing of the situation and exercised a high degree of restraint, which reflects China's manner as a responsible power,” said the spokesperson of the Chinese Government’s Ministry of National Defence. “However,” he added, “the Indian side has repeatedly hyped up the casualties, distorted the truth, misled international public opinion, and slandered the Chinese border troops.”

The video was released shortly after the media outlets controlled by the Communist Party of China and the Chinese Government revealed that the PLA had lost four of its men in the clash with the Indian Army personnel at Galwan Valley on June 15 – Battalion Commander Chen Hongjun (33) and soldiers Chen Xiangrong (19), Xiao Siyuan (24) and Wang Zhuoran (24).

“They all died in a clash with trespassing foreign military personnel wielding steel tubes, cudgels and stones last June,” Xinhua, the official state-run news-agency of China, reported, adding that each of them was awarded the title of “Border Defending Hero” by the Central Military Commission of the communist country.

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The Xinhua also reported that another PLA soldier Qi Fabao had been seriously injured in the skirmish. The video later identified Qi as the commander of a PLA regiment. It claimed that Qi, along with a few other soldiers, had gone to negotiate with his counterpart in the Indian Army in Galwan Valley on June 15, but had come under premeditated attack. It also stated that the PLA soldiers had been outnumbered by the Indian Army personnel, but fought taking advantage of the terrain till the reinforcement arrived. It claimed that the “foreign military” had been “utterly defeated”, paid a “heavy price” and many of its personnel fled, “leaving numerous injured and dead”. It also showed Qi, the PLA Regiment Commander, bleeding profusely from wounds in his head and being given first-aid by other soldiers of the Chinese Army.

The Xinhua and the PLA Daily reported that Qi had also been awarded the title of “Hero Regiment Commander for Defending the Border”.

The Indian Army honoured its Galwan Valley martyrs during the Republic Day ceremony on January 26 this year. Col Babu was posthumously awarded the Maha Vir Chakra, the second highest war-time military decoration of the nation. Five others were honoured with the Vir Chakra. The remaining 14 fallen soldiers were awarded the “Sena Medals”.

Beijing on Friday referred to the PLA personnel killed and injured in the Galwan Valley clash as “iron soldiers” nurtured by Chinese President Xi Jinping’s “Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era” and “Thinking on Strengthening Military”. “They are outstanding representatives of the Chinese military in the new era,” said Senior Colonel Ren Guoqiang, Spokesman for Chinese Ministry of National Defence.