China threat continues, India is not bound by land border law: Army Chief

New Delhi: Chinese military deployment along the eastern Ladakh border still remains a threat despite several rounds of talks between Indian and Chinese Corps Commanders to resolve the longstanding standoff after the Galwan incident.

Army Chief General MM Naravane said the Commander level military talks could see Chinese army disengagement at multiple friction points as the threat in the region has not reduced. However, he reiterated that the present situation on the border is stable and under control.

The army chief was talking to reporters ahead of Army Day on January 15.

Naravane said the situation along the LAC "is stable and under control". He added, however, that India is in a position "to meet whatever is thrown at us in the future". "War or conflict is always an instrument of last resort. But if resorted to, we will come out victorious."

The army chief has stood with the dialogue as an option to resolve the remaining issues with China, though no result is expected after every discussion. However, India is in a position to meet if a warlike situation arises, he said, terming war or conflict as an instrument of last resort.

Naravane has also rejected China's newly enacted land boundary law as the one with which India has no legal binding.

"This law will have no bearing on our bilateral relations and that we do not accept it as such," he said. "India and China have many other agreements and protocols which predate this new law that they have passed. And any new law which is not binding on other countries and which is not legally tenable and is not in keeping with the agreements that we have had in the past, obviously cannot be binding on us," he said.