cross-posted from: https://scribe.disroot.org/post/1848045
Since 2016, China has annexed a number of areas of Bhutan that have for decades, if not centuries, been shown on Bhutanese, international and, till recently, even on many Chinese maps as parts of Bhutan. Research [...] has found that over the last 8 years, China has quietly constructed 22 villages and settlements with a total of some 2,280 residential units in those areas of Bhutan, together with a network of roads, military installations, barracks, outposts and supporting infrastructure. Approximately 7,000 people have been relocated from Tibet (now part of China) to live in those villages, together with what is estimated to be a similar number of officials, construction workers and soldiers. As a result, in the last decade or so Bhutan has lost some 2% of its territory.
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It is not clear why China has been willing to break a bilateral agreement and international law to get these areas [in Buthan] – they are high-altitude grassland with no permanent inhabitants till now, used by the Bhutanese only for yak-grazing and as a nature reserve. Unlike the Doklam plateau, they are not of evident strategic significance to China. But China now has full military and administrative control of those territories, and there is nothing Bhutan can do about it – it has an army of less than 8,000 troops, and there is no sign that India would resort to military intervention on the Bhutan-China border again other than on the Doklam plateau.
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Chinese media have published hundreds of reports about the happy lives of residents in the new [annexed] villages, none of which mention that these are on territory that has long been part of Bhutan and are now disputed. But in its first ever official statement on the annexations, given to CNN in November 2024, China’s foreign ministry appeared to admit that the areas where it has built the new villages are disputed: “China and Bhutan have their own claims regarding the territorial status of the relevant region.” This was followed by an explanation as to why it is carrying out construction and mass population settlements in these disputed areas: “China’s construction activities in the border region with Bhutan are aimed at improving the local livelihoods.” This is a perfectly circular argument since these areas had no residents until China began to build the new cross-border villages eight years ago.
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The apparent purpose of these moves by China is to obtain an area of western Bhutan known as the Doklam plateau, because control of that plateau would give China a military advantage in its ongoing conflicts with India – it overlooks the narrow land strip, known as the Siliguri Corridor, that links India’s heartlands with its seven north-eastern provinces. China has already annexed two-thirds of the 89-sq km Doklam plateau by building roads, military installations and barracks there. It was only deterred from securing the remaining, southern segment by Indian military intervention in 2017.
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