Timelapse videos – China’s Cross-Border Villages in Bhutan

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Forceful Diplomacy: China's Cross-Border Villages in Bhutan

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Timelapse videos – China’s Cross-Border Villages in Bhutan
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Forceful Diplomacy: China's Cross-Border Villages in Bhutan - Robert Barnett

Forceful Diplomacy: China's Cross-Border Villages in Bhutan - Robert Barnett

These timelapse videos show the progress of construction work at each of the main cross-border sites within Bhutan’s customary borders in the years from 2016 to mid- 2024. The earliest of the cross-border villages to be built was Jieluobu, in the north- east of Bhutan, where work began in 2016. Work on the other villages began in late 2019 and continued throughout the following four years. The construction of the village we are calling Semalong 3 began only in March or April 2024.

The videos show monthly low-resolution images of each site from October 2016 to mid-2024, except for months where cloud cover obscured the sites, and except for Semalong 3, where the video shows weekly images from October 2023 to October 2024. The area covered by each video is roughly 1sq km. Each of the sites is within the borders of Bhutan as shown in official Bhutanese maps, apart from Minjiuma and Lower Minjiuma, which were shown as within Bhutan on Bhutanese maps up until the early 2000s. In all cases except for the Demalong outpost, roads were built before village construction or outpost construction began. The roads all connect to the Chinese road network in Tibet (the Tibet Autonomous Region), and none connect with roads in Bhutan, indicating that all these villages and outposts were built by or on instructions from the Chinese authorities.

The videos were produced using the timelapse function in Copernicus Browser (https://browser.dataspace.copernicus.eu/), which uses imagery from Sentinel Hub. The source for all videos is Copernicus Sentinel data 2024.

The report’s analysis of China’s 2023-24 construction surge concludes that China is now extremely unlikely to return to Bhutan the areas where it has built villages. Those areas include about 80% of the disputed territory that China has annexed. China seems likely to argue that it is not obligated to return these areas because Bhutan, given India’s security concerns, is unlikely to be able to yield the Doklam area to China. If Bhutan, as expected, gives the non-Doklam areas in its western border area to China, China in return is likely to give up its claims only to areas it has claimed but not annexed (c. 353 sq kms in the Upper Langmarpo, Charitang, and Yak chu areas in the west and c. 78 sq kms in the Chagdzom area in the north-east). It is also likely to return to Bhutan an area of some 147 sq kms that it has occupied but in which it has not built villages or relocated settlers (the Pagsamlung valley).

In summary:

  • China now has constructed 22 villages and settlements within Bhutan’s customary borders, of which 19 are villages and three are small settlements.
  • Seven of these cross-border villages and settlements have been constructed since early 2023, signalling a marked increase in the speed and extent of construction in the annexed areas.
  • Three of the 19 villages are going to be upgraded to towns.
  • It looks increasingly certain that China will not fulfil its original offer to give back to Bhutan the land in Bhutan’s north-east where it has built villages.
  • Bhutan is likely to get back only those areas which China appears to have claimed or annexed largely as leverage and to give the subsequent appearance of concessions.
  • China’s cross-border village strategy sets a problematic precedent for the international community, since there is no obvious counter for a small state acting alone in response to opportunistic territorial claims and subsequent annexation by a major power.

Maps

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