BEIJING, December 13. /TASS/. China and India have withdrawn troops from a border area where clashes took place recently, PLA (Chinese People’s Liberation Army) Western Theater Command Spokesperson Long Shaohua said on Tuesday.

"As of now, China and India have withdrawn their troops," he said in a statement posted on the WeChat social network.

According to the statement, the recent border conflict flared up when Chinese troops "were on a regular patrol mission." When faced with "the Indian army’s illegitimate actions hindering their patrolling," Chinese soldiers "demonstrated professionalism and continued to control the situation," Long Shaohua said. "We demand the Indian side strictly control its troops deployed to the frontline to maintain peace and security at the border together with China."

On Monday, the ANI news agency, citing its sources, reported clashes between Indian and Chinese border forces in the Tawang sector on December 9. Several servicemen on both sides received wounds.

In May 2020, clashes erupted in the mountainous Ladakh region on the border between the two countries, resulting in casualties on both sides. India and China pulled heavy artillery, tanks and aircraft to the area. After several rounds of talks in 2021, Beijing and New Delhi began to withdraw their forces from the border.

The absence of a demarcated border between India and China in the Himalayas (the two countries are separated by the Line of Actual Control, or LAC) has been a source of tension for decades. In 1959, India claimed that the Chinese side had seized part of the Arunachal Pradesh state. An armed conflict between the two countries broke out in 1962 and China took control of around 38,000 square kilometers of India’s soil in Ladakh and Aksai Chin.