China’s forked-tongue attitude towards India was in full display this week with Beijing asserting its claim over Arunachal Pradesh while simultaneously talking about working with New Delhi and Moscow to defend multilateralism.

A day after renaming 11 locations in Arunachal Pradesh, Chinese foreign ministry spokesperson Mao Ning said on Monday: "China, Russia and India are all major emerging countries with notable influence. As the international and regional landscape is facing profound and complex changes, we are ready to strengthen communication with the international community including Russia and India and send a positive signal to the world about defending true multilateralism and jointly responding to global challenges."

She was addressing a media conference during which the ministry’s reaction was sought on the new foreign policy concept of Russia that was unveiled by President Vladimir Putin last Friday.

Russia, in its fresh foreign policy, envisages deepening relations with both India and China as a diplomatic priority for Moscow in a recalibration that has come close on the heels of Chinese President Xi Jinping’s Moscow visit last month.

The iteration of a "no limits" relationship had given rise to speculation that it could eclipse Moscow’s engagement with New Delhi.

While China paid lip service to working with India and Russia to defend multilateralism, its action of coming out with the third list of names for places in Arunachal Pradesh in six years added another irritant to an already vexed relationship.

Asked about the rationale for renaming 11 places in Arunachal Pradesh — which India rejected by pointing out that "invented names will not alter the reality" — the Chinese foreign ministry spokesperson said: "Zangnan (the Chinese name for Arunachal Pradesh) is part of China’s territory. In accordance with relevant stipulations of the administration of geographical names of the State Council, competent authorities of the Chinese government have standardised the names of some parts of Zangnan. This is within China’s sovereign rights."

The White House has weighed in on the renaming by pointing out that the US has always recognised Arunachal Pradesh as part of India. "We strongly oppose any unilateral attempts to advance territorial claims by renaming localities."