China has renamed 15 places in Arunachal Pradesh to yet again show aggression in its futile claim on the northeastern state of India, even as soldiers of the two nations remained engaged in a stand-off all along the disputed boundary in eastern Ladakh over the past 20 months. 

The Ministry of Civil Affairs of the Chinese Government announced on Wednesday that it had “standardised” in Mandarin Chinese characters as well as in Tibetan and Roman alphabets the names of the 15 places in Zangnan or the southern part of Xizang (Tibet Autonomous Region), The Global Times, a state-affiliated media outlet of the communist country, reported.

Beijing claims areas worth 90,000 sq km in Arunachal Pradesh of India as part of the territory of China and calls it Zangnan or south Tibet. New Delhi, however, rejects Beijing’s claim and says that the entire state of Arunachal Pradesh is an integral part of India.

The outlet reported on Thursday that the names were “standardised in accordance with regulations on geographical names issued by the State Council” of China. The State Council is the chief administrative authority of China.

The 15 places, which the Chinese Government renamed, included eight residential places, four mountains, two rivers and a mountain pass in Arunachal Pradesh.

The report quoted China's ministry spokesperson saying in February 2020 that China had never recognised Arunachal Pradesh as a part of the Indian territory. It also quoted Lian Xiangmin, an expert with the China Tibetology Research Center in Beijing, saying that China had exercised its sovereign rights and made a “legitimate move” to standardise the names of 15 places in south Tibet.

New Delhi has not yet officially reacted to China’s latest move to reassert its claim on Arunachal Pradesh of India. But it had a strong reaction to a similar action in April 2017 when China had renamed six places in Arunachal Pradesh. India had dismissed China’s move, with the spokesperson of the Ministry of External Affairs stating in New Delhi that “assigning invented names to the towns of your neighbours does not make illegal territorial claims legal”.

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