There are times the world suddenly wakes up to reality. It almost seems like the same when satellite imagery analysts and conflict experts worldwide have suddenly woken up to China’s excesses in Bhutanese territory only in the year 2021. At least four new village settlements have been identified along the Sino-Bhutan border areas. The fact is, these have been coming for the last few years. Its only that the world has woken up to it now.

Ever since 2017, Xi Jinping has been vociferous about pushing China to expand into new frontiers along its borders and outside of it. The focus has been around Tibetan borderlands and the border along Bhutan to outflank and marginalize India in the South-Asian perspective.

The village name doing the rounds now is Gyalaphug. While China originally claimed to have set this up in the South TAR (Tibet Autonomous Region) for Tibetans to resettle and “raise the bright five-star red flag high”, it is in fact located well inside Bhutan’s territory.

What do we know about China’s excesses?

The village Gyalaphug is located almost 7 kilometers into Bhutan territory, which has been claimed by China since the 1980s. Records and maps available internationally show that it is indeed Bhutanese territory inside which China has now resettled its civilians, military personnel, and others after building civilian and military infrastructure in the location. It is important to remember that China also has longstanding border issues with Bhutan in other areas of its borders too.

The infrastructure in the villages includes the following but not limited to 100-plus kilometers of well laid roads, CCP offices, military outposts, a small power plant, and signal towers. Originally formalized in 2018, the village has now expanded well enough for the world to take notice. It is estimated that hundreds of people can now live in this village which has similar-looking houses to accommodate those.

Satellite imagery shows that on average, the four villages look to be 3-4 kilometers within the disputed territories. The fast-paced construction of these villages happened between the years 2020 and 2021 with further work still going on in these locations.

OSINT expert @detresfa_ shared some key insights and imagery with India Today. Detresfa’s work estimates that these 4 villages amount to almost 100 square kilometers of area within the disputed territories.

The most fascinating thing about this trespassing by China is that even Chinese maps from the 1980s show this location where the Gyalaphug village is located as Bhutanese territory. The time-lapse videos of villages situated in the region show the rapid increase of construction activity by China.

While China in the past has, during multiple times, built roads into disputed territories, it has seldom gone as far as building a whole town inside a disputed territory, despite the land being internationally recognized as Bhutanese territory.

China’s border disputes with Bhutan:

Detresfa charts out a simple map with some general locations identifying various cross-border activities undertaken by China into Bhutan over the years, allowing for an overview of the “Salami Slicing”. It clearly shows that China and Bhutan have numerous border disputes and differences along their 470-kilometer border. While most of these 4 villages fall under the “disputed areas” tag, China’s construction of these villages violates the 1998 agreement between the two nations, which states that the disputed lands should be left alone until a consensus is reached about its belonging.

In terms of West Bhutan, China has already constructed a village named Pangda. This, too, has roads constructed with new infrastructure about to come up. It is also precariously close to Doklam.

Aside this, the existing dialogue over the ownership of territory towards the North of Bhutan, namely Beyul Khenpajong and the Menchuma Valley remains in limbo with China asking Bhutan to trade it for the 269 square km of its territory in the west, which includes Charithang, Sinchulungpa, Dramana, Shakhatoe and the prized location of Doklam. This is also a region that Chinese maps in the eighties showed as belonging to Bhutanese territory. Bhutan and India are aware of the significance and sensitivity this piece of land holds for India’s security. It is the prime reason why China tried to construct a road at Doklam, and Indian Army had to step in to stop this after a 73-day faceoff with the PLA soldiers.

As the image below shows, the Doklam plateau’s closeness to the Siliguri Corridor, is a gateway for India’s northeast regions to the rest of the country. In the event of a war in the future, this could be a strategic area for a PLA escapade.

This is the major reason for China to continually keep adding more pressure on Bhutan over recent years. Recently, China staked claim for an area that is East of Bhutan, the famous Sakteng wildlife reserve. The most audacious thing about this move is that this has never been raised by China before and the obvious fact that this area does not even belong to the border areas between the two countries.