New Delhi [India], May 3 : China has territorial disputes with more countries than it shares its borders with. The Chinese Communist Party, the CCP, with Xi Jinping at the helm, has used deceitful tactics and mpulation in order to attempt to assert territorial control over other sovereign territories. Beijing has flouted all international norms in its expansionist bid to control more territory.
A strained Indo-Chinese relationship is witnessing a further plunge, courtesy of China's repeated illegal and provocative campaigns to alter the status quo along the Line of Actual Control, the de facto border between the two nuclear-armed countries.
China has now staked claims on parts of India's northeastern state of Arunachal Pradesh, arguing that these locations were part of greater Tibet.
A desperate Beijing unilaterally renamed as many as 11 Indian locations, which included names of mountain peaks, rivers and residential areas.
This is not the first time that Beijing has employed such tactics. Previously in 2017 and 2021, China's Civil Affair Ministry had renamed other Indian locations triggering another political confrontation. New Delhi called out China's expansionist plans then, and New Delhi is calling out China's expansionist plans now.
The official spokesperson for the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA), Arindam Bagchi, while commenting on China's attempt of showing its domination in places belonging to India's Arunachal Pradesh said in a MEA said, "This is not the first time that China has attempted something like this (changing the names of areas in Arunachal Pradesh) and we have already condemned any such attempts. Regarding Arunachal Pradesh, we had also said that Arunachal Pradesh is an inseparable part of India) and imposing invented names like these will not at all change the reality."
China is aggressively trying to increase its influence in the Indo-Pacific region, which is home to 65 nearly per cent of the world's population. According to the Observer Research Foundation (ORF), China's rise as an economic and military powerhouse has resulted in a tectonic shift in the power balance.
ORF research indicates that managing the rise of a tactfully aggressive China will be critical for the safety, security, and stability of the Indo-Pacific.
And while the majority of the countries in the Indo-Pacific region are now facing territorial conflicts with China, they find India, Australia and Japan as emerging power centres that can both challenge and check China's ambitionist and expansionist plans.
Satoru Nagao, a Fellow (non-resident) at the Hudson Institute, explained the importance of QUAD to stand against China's expansionism, saying, "At the same time this region is under threat from China's domination. When we compare Asia-Pacific and Indo-Pacific, we can find one feature. The Indo-Pacific includes all countries which have the problem with China, specially the border problem. That's why the Indo-Pacific find it easier to deal with China. Shinzo Abe introduced the concept of Indo-Pacific in Quad, which is a group of great powers in the Indo-Pacific, excluding China. That's why the Indo-Pacific in the Quad is important as a concept to deal with China."
China's expansionist agenda was established in 2013 by President Xi Jinping with the launch of the Belt and Road Initiative, BRI. To date, a total of 147 countries have signed on to BRI projects or indicated an interest in doing so.
However, many of these countries are now concerned that China is using BRI funds to gain influence and control and that they are falling into a debt trap. (Source: Council on Foreign Relations)
Beijing's expansionism is not only a threat to its neighbours, but the entire Indo-Pacific region and other countries. India's efforts to contain China will not only benefit India and her citizens but the broader Indo-Pacific region as well.
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