New Delhi: India and its Asian neighbour begun its troop disengagement at the two friction points at Demchok and Depsang Plains in eastern Ladakh on Friday.
The process is likely to get completed by October 28-29, PTI reported citing Army sources.
The process is in the dotted line of an agreement arrived at between the two countries on patrolling and disengagement of troops along the Line of Actual Control (LAC) in eastern Ladakh. The security analysts see it is a major breakthrough to end the over four-year standoff with China.
According to sources, the patrolling will begin at the two friction points once the disengagement is complete. Both sides are expected to move their respective troops and dismantle temporary structures, in the process.
A source exuded confidence that the patrolling status is expected to move back to pre-April 2020 level, eventually.
The agreement framework, the army sources said, was first agreed upon at the diplomatic level. "It was further firmed up in the military-level talks that followed. The nitty-gritty of agreement was worked in Corps Commander-level talks," the army source revealed.
Adhering to agreements between the two sides, Indian troops have begun to pull back equipment to rear locations in these areas.
The Sino-India ties nosedived following a brutal clash in the Galwan Valley in June 2020. It was also marked as one of the most serious military conflict between the two neighbours in decades.
On October 23, Prime Minister Narendra Modi and China President Xi Jinping endorsed the agreement on patrolling and disengagement along the LAC in eastern Ladakh during their bilateral meeting on the sidelines of the BRICS Summit in Kazan in Russia.
Two days before that, Foreign Secretary Vikram Misri said in Delhi that the agreement had been finalised following several weeks of negotiations. He added that it would resolve the issues that arose in 2020.
