China admits 5 officers, soldiers killed in Galwan Valley clash with Indian Army

TIL Desk/World/Beijing/ Five Chinese military officers and soldiers were killed in the fierce clash with the Indian Army in the Galwan Valley in eastern Ladakh in June last year, the People”s Liberation Army (PLA) officially acknowledged for the first time on Friday.

Five Chinese frontier officers and soldiers stationed in the Karakoram Mountains have been recognised by the Central Military Commission of China (CMC) for their sacrifice in the border confrontation with India, which occurred in the Galwan Valley in June 2020, the PLA Daily, the official newspaper of the Chinese military reported on Friday.

Those killed included Qi Fabao, the regimental commander from the PLA Xinjiang Military Command, state-run Global Times quoted PLA Daily report as saying.

The border standoff between the Indian and Chinese militaries erupted on May 5 last year following a violent clash in the Pangong Lake areas and both sides gradually enhanced their deployment by rushing in tens of thousands of soldiers as well as heavy weaponry.

Twenty Indian soldiers were killed in the fierce hand-to-hand combat on June 15 in Galwan Valley, an incident that marked the most serious military conflicts between the two sides in decades.