History
Historically the people of Hunza cultivated and grazed areas to the north of the Karakoram, and the Mir of Hunza claimed those areas as part of Hunza's territories. Those areas included the Raskam Valley, north of the Shaksgam Valley.
In 1889 the first expedition to the Shaksgam Valley by a Westerner was undertaken by Francis Younghusband (who referred to the Shaksgam as the Oprang). In March 1899 the British proposed, in a Note from Sir Claude MacDonald to China, a new boundary between China and British India. The Note proposed that China should relinquish its claims to suzerainty over Hunza, and in return Hunza should relinquish its claims to most of the Taghdumbash and Raskam districts. The Note proposed a border which broadly followed the main Karakoram crest dividing the watersheds of the Indus River and the Tarim River, but with a variation to pass through a Hunza post at Darwaza near the Shimshal Pass. The Chinese did not respond to the Note, and the British took that as acquiescence. The Macdonald line was modified in 1905 to include in India a small area east of the Shimshal Pass, to put the border on the Oprang Jilga River and a stretch of the Shaksgam River.
At the same time Britain was concerned at the danger of Russian expansion as China weakened. Britain adopted a policy of claiming a border north of the Shaksgam River, following a line proposed by Sir John Ardagh in a Memorandum of 1897. That border included the Mir of Hunza's claim over the Raskam Valley. However, the British never administered north of the Karakoram watershed.
From 1899 until the independence of India and Pakistan in 1947, the representation of the border on maps varied. In 1926 Kenneth Mason explored and surveyed the Shaksgam Valley In 1927 the Government of British India abandoned any claim to the area north of the Macdonald line, but the decision did not find its way on to British maps. By 1959, however, Chinese maps were published showing large areas west and south of the Macdonald line in China. That year, the Government of Pakistan announced its willingness to consult on the boundary question.
From 1947 India claimed sovereignty over the entire area of the pre-1947 Jammu and Kashmir, and therefore maintained that Pakistan and China did not share a common border.
Read more about this topic: Trans-Karakoram Tract
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