'Inherent territory': China defends its renaming of 15 areas in Arunachal Pradesh

China has defended its renaming of 15 places in southern Tibet, including areas in Arunachal Pradesh, as "completely within" its sovereignty.

China's Ministry of Civil Affairs earlier announced that it had standardized the names of 15 places in Zangnan, the southern part of Tibet, in Chinese characters, as well as the Tibetan and Roman alphabets.

The Ministry of External Affairs had reasserted the country's claim over the region in response, saying "assigning invented names to places in Arunachal Pradesh does not alter this fact."

At a daily news briefing Friday, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Zhao Lijian argued that southern part of Tibet was China's "inherent territory."

He said people of different ethnic groups, such as Tibetan and Monba, have been living in that area for many years and have given names to many places in that area.

India said this was not the first time China had sought to rename places in the state of Arunachal Pradesh, noting an occasion it attempted to do so in April 2017.

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