Bhutan–China border

Talks without an embassy

Bhutan and China began border talks in 1984, signed guiding principles in 1988 and an agreement on peace and tranquillity along the border in 1998. They have no direct diplomatic relations and deal with each other through their embassies in New Delhi. The talks have focused on two areas: about 269 km² in Bhutan’s west, including Doklam near the tripoint with India, and 495 km² in the Jakarlung and Pasamlung valleys in the north. In July 2020 China also claimed Sakteng in the east, for the first time since 1986.^[1]

In 2021 the two countries signed a memorandum on a roadmap “for expediting” the talks, believed to have been settled at their tenth expert-group meeting, in Kunming in April that year; Bhutan called the process sensitive and gave no details.^[1]

Doklam

In 2017 India objected to China building a road on the Doklam plateau, which China and Bhutan both claim.^[2][1] India, Bhutan’s ally, sent troops, saying the road threatened its own northeast. After more than two months face to face, India and China agreed on 28 August to an “expeditious disengagement”; China said its troops would keep patrolling the area.^[2]

Since then China has strengthened its hold over much of the plateau, and Chinese media have shown a newly built village there. India has long worried that a Bhutan–China deal could trade away the area near the tripoint, and Beijing has blamed India’s concerns for slowing the talks.^[1]

“China will continue to exercise sovereignty rights to protect territorial sovereignty in accordance with the rules of the historical boundary”^[2]

Villages on the line

In the 1998 agreement both countries promised not to change the status quo of the border unilaterally. Writing in 2024, Robert Barnett counted 22 villages and settlements that China had built since about 2016 inside Bhutan’s customary borders, with some 2,200 homes, eight in the west near Doklam and fourteen in the northeast.^[3]

Barnett links the northeastern villages to a “package deal” China offered in 1990, dropping its claims there if Bhutan gave up western areas including Doklam. He notes that Bhutan’s maps no longer show one northeastern area, Menchuma, as Bhutanese. China describes the two as linked by “profound traditional friendship”, and Bhutan speaks of friendly and cooperative relations.^[3]