At a time when tension between India and China is high owing to the ongoing military standoff in Eastern Ladakh along the Line of Actual Control (LAC), Chinese President Xi Jinping has reportedly asked his troops to prepare for war. News reports have quoted Xi Jinping telling the Chinese soldiers to stay “absolutely loyal” to the country.

According to a report published by CNN, Xi Jinping visited a military base in Guangdong on Tuesday, when he asked the Chinese troops to “put all (their) minds and energy on preparing for war and maintain a state of high alert”.

In his address at the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) Marine Corps, Xi Jinping asked the troops to “maintain a state of high alert” besides telling them to be “absolutely loyal, absolutely pure, and absolutely reliable”.

However, it was not yet clear whether this comment was directed towards India or the US and other countries with which China is embroiled in a tussle in the South China Sea region, or to both.

Meanwhile, reporting Xi’s visit to the military base, Xinhua reported, Xi Jinping emphasised on “speeding up the transformation and construction, speeding up the improvement of combat capabilities, and striving to forge a strong force with multiple capabilities and rapid response across the field”.

“Xi Jinping emphasised that it is necessary to uphold the party’s absolute leadership over the militarypay close attention to comprehensively and strictly govern the party and the militaryand ensure that the troops are absolutely loyal, absolutely pure, and absolutely reliable.

On Tuesday, India and China held their seventh round of Corps Commanders-level talks to resolve military standoff in Ladakh region. The faceoff began in early May and has continued since then.

India and China have held several rounds of military, diplomatic and ministerial-level talks to defuse the ongoing military tension but without much success.

In June, the two sides were involved in a major violent faceoff in the strategically significant Galwan Valley. Twenty Indian soldiers, including a Colonel-rank officer, were killed in it. Chinese side too suffered casualties in the faceoff but it has not made the number of casualties public.