Indian Intelligence: China stepped up border intrusions before talks

India's Intelligence Bureau isn't exactly ready to welcome special envoy Dai Bingguo's declaration that we're embarking on a "golden era" of India-China relations.

Why?

Turns out that China has stepped up incursions across the disputed borders in Arunachal Pradesh, Kashmir and even Uttarakhand, even as Dai was making plans for a mechanism to "resolve" conflicts that occur when Chinese soldiers accidentally start building trenches on the India's side of the line, according to a classified Intelligence Bureau document ferreted out by India Today.

The link is not available yet, as India Today apparently still has some aspirations of selling its content for actual money. But if you're near enough to a newstand, the article makes for interesting reading.

Quoting from the classified document, it reads:

During the month [November 2011 — when Dai canceled his visit for border talks] there were 20 incidents of LAC [Line of Actual Control] violations by the Chinese. During the current year, 323 transgressions were reported: western sector 194, middle sector-9 and eastern sector-120. In the corresponding period of 2010 there were 324 intrusions: 224 in the western sector, 111 in teh middle and 90 in the eastern sector in Arunachal.

The note also says that India raised the issue of a Chinese trench being built on the Indian side of the LAC in Ladakh — just about the time that China decided to make a stink about the Asoka Mission's Buddhist conference in New Delhi and drop out of the planned border talks, as I wrote about in my articles about India's Look East policy and the "Battle for Buddha" as a key to influence in the region.

Always interesting to learn what the spooks are saying behind the scenes.