China clarifies maritime policy in disputed sea

From the Manila Standard Today (Dec 6): China clarifies maritime policy in disputed sea

Beijing clarified on Wednesday its new maritime rules on the South China Sea (Wes Philippine Sea), saying that Chinese naval forces would “search and repel” foreign vessels only if they were engaged in illegal activities and only if the ships were within the 12 nautical miles zone of the surrounding islands that China claims. The explanation was made by Wu Shicun, the director-general of the Foreign Affairs Office of the province of Hainan in South China, in the wake of protests from China’s neighboring countries and the United States and in response to the letter of the Foreign Affairs Department seeking clarification on the new maritime laws.

Hainan, a province located in South China, administers the newly-built Sansha City in the South China Sea (West Philippine Sea), which was given direct control over the highly-disputed territories. Wu, a policymaker to matters pertaining to the South China Sea, added that the new regulations do not apply to all of the territories that Beijing claims. The Chinese government has been insisting that it owns virtually the entire South China Sea, a claim that is being contested by the Philippines, Vietnam, Malaysia, Brunei, and Taiwan. He added that the main purpose of coming up with the new maritime laws was to police Vietnamese fishing boats operating in the waters near Yongxing island in the Paracels, which China calls the Xisha islands.

“The outside world should not overreact to the revision of these rules, or read too much into them, nor should anyone give a one-sided or distorted explanation,” said Wu in a statement posted in today online website. “A big worry for neighboring countries and countries outside the region is that China is growing so rapidly, and they see it is possible China taking over the islands by force,” Wu said. “I think China needs to convince neighboring countries that this is not the case,” Wu said adding that neighboring countries must “trust” China that it would not use “force in the sea”.

He added, however, that the new regulations apply to all of the hundreds of islands scattered across the sea, and their surrounding waters – including the disputed islands claimed by other countries including Vietnam and the Philippines. The regulations are set to take effect on January 1 and this would apply to the sea around islands or its “baselines.” A baseline is the low-water line along the coast from which countries measure their territorial waters, as provided by the United Nation Convention on the Law of the Sea. “But for islands whose territorial water baselines have not yet been announced, since there is no way to clearly define the width of their territorial sea, the aforementioned problem does not exist,” he said. Wu said that the full text of the new regulations would be made available next year. The “baseline” that China was referring, Wu said, was claimed by Vietnam in 1996 – and also by the Philippines, Malaysia, Brunei and Taiwan.

Foreign Affairs had said earlier that China’s claim was in excess of the provisions of international law. The Philippines, Vietnam, India and the United States had registered their protest right after Beijing announced the new maritime regulations, saying that China’s action was a threat to all countries whose vessels pass by the South China Sea (West Philippine Sea). On Wednesday, Manila asked Beijing to clarify the report which first came out in the China Daily, a government-owned news website.

http://manilastandardtoday.com/2012/12/06/china-clarifies-maritime-policy-in-disputed-sea/