China has claimed it played a mediating role in the brief but intense military confrontation between India and Pakistan in May, a position New Delhi has firmly rejected.
Chinese foreign minister Wang Yi, speaking at the Symposium on the International Situation and China’s Foreign Relations in Beijing on Tuesday, said China adopted an “objective and just stance” to help defuse several global conflicts. “To build peace that lasts, we focused on addressing both symptoms and root causes,” Wang said, listing the India–Pakistan tensions alongside disputes in northern Myanmar, the Iranian nuclear issue, Palestine–Israel, and Cambodia–Thailand.
The claim comes even as Beijing’s role during the May 7–10 confrontation has drawn scrutiny, with Indian officials alleging that China treated the crisis as a “live lab.” Deputy Chief of Army Staff Lt Gen Rahul R Singh earlier said Beijing’s approach reflected its ancient military doctrine of the “36 stratagems,” accusing it of attempting to hurt India by “killing with a borrowed knife”—a veiled reference to alleged Chinese support for Islamabad.
Meanwhile, the Indian Army on Tuesday highlighted key outcomes of Operation Sindoor. It said nine terror camps across the border were destroyed—seven by the Army and two by the Indian Air Force—while air defence units neutralised Pakistani drone attempts targeting military and civilian assets. The Army also said more than a dozen terror launch pads along the Line of Control were destroyed using ground-based weapons.
According to the Army, Pakistan’s Director General of Military Operations approached his Indian counterpart seeking a ceasefire, after which both sides agreed to halt firing and military action.
The confrontation followed a terror attack in the Pahalgam valley on April 22 that killed 26 civilians. India responded with strikes on terror infrastructure in Pakistan and Pakistan-occupied Kashmir.
New Delhi has consistently dismissed any suggestion of third-party mediation, maintaining that the four-day standoff was resolved through direct military-to-military communication after Pakistan sought de-escalation following significant losses.
