China on Tuesday added a fresh twist to its long-running boundary dispute with India, saying it has “never recognised” the Union Territory of Ladakh, created in August 2019. New Delhi hit back, reiterating that Ladakh is an “integral and inalienable” part of India.“No amount of denial by the Chinese side can change this established fact,” Ministry of External Affairs spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal said in response to Beijing’s claim.India and China share an 832-km disputed and undemarcated boundary in eastern Ladakh, known as the Line of Actual Control (LAC). With overlapping territorial claims, the frontier remains heavily militarised on both sides.The latest exchange was triggered by India’s October 2 move to assign standard names to 28 geographical features in Ladakh. China on Tuesday dismissed the exercise as “illegal, null and void”.Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Mao Ning, quoted by state-run news agency Xinhua, said: “China has never recognised the so-called Union Territory of Ladakh illegally and unilaterally established by India and firmly opposes India’s publication of standard place names in Ladakh.”In an apparent reference to Aksai Chin and India’s naming of several features there, Mao said such actions were “illegal and null and void” and could not alter “the fact that the western section of the China-India boundary area has always belonged to China”. The western sector refers to the India-China boundary in Ladakh.Mao made the remarks at a press briefing in Beijing, two years after Indian and Chinese troops pulled back from a four-year military standoff along the LAC in eastern Ladakh that began in 2020. The confrontation had witnessed multiple clashes, including the Galwan Valley clash in June 2020.On October 2, India formally assigned names to several lakes, peaks and other geographical features in Ladakh, including some located across the LAC in Aksai Chin, an area under Chinese control since the 1950s. The region forms the northeastern part of the Union Territory of Ladakh.Responding to Beijing’s criticism, Jaiswal said the Ministry of Home Affairs’ press release was self-explanatory. “The announcement mentions that the 28 features located in the UT of Ladakh have been identified with standard place and feature names on the official map of Survey of India,” he said.The exercise was aimed at ensuring accurate identification of these locations and improving public awareness about them, he added.Ladakh was carved out of the erstwhile state of Jammu and Kashmir in August 2019 after Parliament abrogated Article 370 and reorganised the state into two Union Territories — Jammu and Kashmir, and Ladakh.