NEW DELHI: China on Friday claimed sovereignty on Doklam, a border site where it recently had a tense showdown with Indian troops, The Hindu said on Friday.

Reporting from Beijing, the newspaper quoted Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Lu Kang as asserting that China was entitled to build infrastructure in Doklam.

Mr Lu, however, declined to comment specifically on purported satellite pictures that apparently show fresh construction in the area.

“I don’t know who offers such kind of photos. I don’t know the detailed information,” Mr Lu said when asked about the images. But he reiterated that Doklam was a Chinese sovereign territory, where Beijing was entitled to build infrastructure at its discretion.

“China is exercising its sovereignty in its own territory. It’s legitimate and justified. Just as China will not make comments about Indian construction of infrastructure on India’s territory, we hope other countries will not make comment on China’s construction of infrastructure on its territory,” he said.

“You must be quite clear. Donglong [Doklam] always belongs to China and is always under China’s effective jurisdiction. There is no dispute in this regard,” he said.

Beijing had constructed “infrastructure, including road in the Donglang area”, he asserted, but was ambiguous on whether this was fresh construction after the Doklam crisis. Neither did he say whether there was any infrastructure development specifically at the face-off area, from where troops from both sides disengaged last year after a 73-day face-off.

In New Delhi, the Ministry of External Affairs said in a statement on Thursday that “the status quo at the face-off site has not been altered”, adding that “any suggestion to the contrary is inaccurate and mischievous.”

Mr Lu blamed Indian troops for last summer’s Doklam crisis on account of their so-called “illegal transgress”. He added: “We hope the Indian side learns lesson and avoids the incident to happen again.” He cited the Xiamen BRICS summit in September where Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Chinese President Xi Jinping met as the touchstone for improving ties.

“Actually, during the Xiamen summit last year, the two leaders reached some consensus on improving and developing bilateral relations and chartering the course for future developments,” he observed.

Published in Dawn, January 20th, 2018