by Admin | Jun 9, 2014 | News
(BGF) – The Philippine Daily Inquirer reported the crowd of about 500 people protested against China’s claims to much of the South China Sea in front of the Chinese consulate in Manila. A small group of Vietnamese also joined the protest, waving anti- China banners, as a support to the Philippines in the struggle against an aggressive China. The protest also attracted participation of the Philippine former government and army officials.
Click here to read the full story or visit the Inquirer website.
Filipinos, Vietnamese protest China’s territorial claims
July 24, 2013
A Fililipino protester holds a slogan beside a Philippine flag during a rally outside the Chinese Consulate in suburban Makati, south of Manila, Philippines on Tuesday June 11, 2013. The group held the rally to oppose China’s alleged continued intrusion and poaching activities in the West Philippine Sea. (Photo Credit: Associated Press)
MANILA, Philippines — Hundreds of people in the Philippine capital protested Wednesday against China’s claims to much of the vast South China Sea, saying Beijing’s intrusions into other countries’ territories would tarnish its image as it becomes a world power.
Waving Philippine flags and blowing horns, the protesters massed in front of a building housing the Chinese consulate in Manila, blocking noontime traffic. The Chinese consulate closed its visa office due to the protest.
Anti-riot police closely watched the crowd of about 500, which sang nationalist songs, yelled anti-China slogans and held up placards that read: “China stop bullying” and “China get out of the West Philippine Sea.”
The West Philippine Sea is a new name the Philippine government has adopted for the disputed body of water that has been the site of recent confrontations involving Chinese military and civilian surveillance ships and those from the Philippines and Vietnam.
Six governments — China, the Philippines, Vietnam, Brunei, Malaysia and Taiwan — lay claim to disputed territories in the sea, which is home to busy shipping lanes and is potentially rich in oil and gas deposits. Many fear the disputes could eventually spark Asia’s next major armed conflict.
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by Admin | Jun 7, 2014 | News
(BGF) – In a website, Vietnam has proved its claim over Spratly and Paracel Islands by stating historical, legal documents along with principles of international law and internal practices. In this report, Vietnam has historical sovereignty over the disputed waters.
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VIETNAM CONTINUOUSLY EXERCISES ITS SOVEREIGNTY OVER HOANG SA, TRUONG SA ARCHIPELAGOS
August 9, 2012
The Hoang Sa (Paracel) and the Truong Sa (Spratly) are the two archipelagoes to the East of the Vietnamese coast in the East Sea. The closest point of the Hoang Sa is about 170 nautical miles from the central city of Da Nang and about 120 nautical miles from the Re island, a near-shore island of Vietnam. While, the Truong Sa is about 250 nautical miles from the Cam Ranh Bay, Nha Trang city, Khanh Hoa province, at its closest point.
In the past, with sketchy information about the Hoang Sa and the Truong Sa archipelagos, navigators knew little about a large area of submerged reefs very dangerous for boats. Ancient Vietnamese documents indicated this area with various names, including “Bai Cat Vang” (Golden Sandbank), “Hoang Sa” (Golden Sand), “Van Ly Hoang Sa” (Ten-Thousand-Mile Golden Sand), “Truong Sa” (Long Sand) or “Van Ly Truong Sa” (Ten-Thousand-Mile Long Sand). Most of the maps drawn by Western navigators from the 16th to the 18th centuries marked the Hoang Sa and Truong Sa archipelagoes under one single name: Pracel, Parcel, or Paracels. All of the above-mentioned maps generally located Pracel (including both the Hoang Sa and the Truong Sa) as an area in the East Sea, east of Vietnam, off Vietnamese near-shore islands. Later, thanks to progress in navigation science, the Hoang Sa archipelagoes and the Truong Sa archipelagoes were clearly defined.
The two archipelagos identified as the Paracels and the Spratley or Spratly in present-day international maritime maps are precisely the two Vietnamese archipelagoes of “Hoang Sa” and “Truong Sa”. The appellations of Xisha and Nansha were given by China several decades ago to make claims to sovereignty over these islands. Long ago, the Vietnamese people discovered the Hoang Sa and Truong Sa archipelagoes. The Vietnamese state had occupied and exercised its sovereignty over the two archipelagoes in an actual, continuous and peaceful manner.
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by Admin | Jun 7, 2014 | News
(BGF) – China took a new action to further claim its sovereignty over the South China Sea by printing a map including the disputed territories inside its new Chinese passports. This has infuriated Vietnam and the Philippines as China is forcing its neighbor immigration officials and citizens to implicitly recognize Chinese claims over the South China Sea every time a Chinese citizen is given a visa or an entry or exit stamp in one of the new paspports.
The Financial Times made a report on this issue. Click here to read the full article or visit its website.
China stamps passports with sea claims
Nov 21, 2012 | By Jamil Anderlini in Beijing and Ben Bland in Phnom Penh
(Photo Credit by People’s Daily)
“It’s one very poisonous step by Beijing among their thousands of malevolent actions” — Nguyen Quang A
Beijing has included its South China Sea territorial claims on maps printed inside new Chinese passports, infuriating at least one of its neighbours.
Vietnam has made a formal complaint to Beijing about the new passports.
“The Vietnamese side has taken note of this matter and the two sides are discussing it, but so far there has been no result,” said Vietnam’s embassy in Beijing.
Other countries that have clashed with China over its assertions in the South China Sea, in particular the Philippines, are also worried China is trying to force their immigration officials to implicitly recognise Chinese claims every time a Chinese citizen is given a visa or an entry or exit stamp in one of the new passports.
The Philippines embassy in Beijing has not responded to requests for comment.
The territorial disputes in the South and East China Seas have overshadowed a series of summits of Asia-Pacific leaders in Cambodia attended by US President Barack Obamathis week, with discord among southeast Asian nations over how to respond to an increasingly assertive China.
China claims virtually the entire South China Sea, including large swaths of territory that smaller neighbouring countries say belongs to them, and Beijing has been increasingly strident in recent years in asserting those claims.
The claims are represented on Chinese maps by a “nine-dash line” that incorporates the entire South China Sea and hugs the coastline of the Philippines, Brunei, Malaysia, Vietnam and a small part of Indonesia.
The nine dashes enclose a region that is believed to be rich in undersea energy reserves and also incorporate the self-ruled island of Taiwan, which Beijing claims as its territory.
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by Admin | Jun 7, 2014 | News
(BGF) – China had blamed the United States for emboldening the Philippines and Vietnam to challenge its claims over the South China Sea. It has adopted more aggressive stance to assert “its sovereignty” over territorial disputes. The Reuters reported it formally established a military garrison for the South China Sea.
Click here to read the full article or visit Reuters website.
China’s hawks gaining sway in S. China sea dispute
July 25, 2012| by David Lague
(Reuters) – China has adopted a more aggressive stance in recent weeks on territorial disputes in the South China Sea as hard-line officials and commentators call on Beijing to take a tougher line with rival claimants.
China’s supreme policymaking body, the Politburo Standing Committee, is made up entirely of civilians, but outspoken People’s Liberation Army (PLA) officers, intelligence advisers and maritime agency chiefs are arguing that Beijing should be more forceful in asserting its sovereignty over the sea and the oil and natural gas believed to lie under the sea-bed.
Most of them blame the United States’ so-called strategic “pivot” to Asia for emboldening neighbouring countries, particularly the Philippines and Vietnam, to challenge China’s claims.
“China now faces a whole pack of aggressive neighbours headed by Vietnam and the Philippines and also a set of menacing challengers headed by the United States, forming their encirclement from outside the region,” wrote Xu Zhirong, a deputy chief captain with China Marine Surveillance, in the June edition of China Eye, a publication of the Hong Kong-based China Energy Fund Committee.
“And, such a band of eager lackeys is exactly what the U.S. needs for its strategic return to Asia,” he wrote.
Most Chinese and foreign security policy analysts believe China wants to avoid military conflict across sea lanes that carry an annual $5 trillion in ship-borne trade, particularly if it raises the prospect of U.S. intervention.
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by Admin | Jun 6, 2014 | News
(BGF) – The Philippines Daily Inquirer said the Global Times, the China’s top newspaper, had assailed the Philippines and Vietnam for their “attempt to grab islands and waters (in the South China Sea), which don’t belong to them” by getting alliance with the United States. Liu Zongyi, a research fellow of the Center for South Asia Studies at the Shanghai Institutes for International Studies, made a report on the Global Times to note that US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton “made a trip encircling China recently.
Click here to read the full article or visit the Inquirer’s website.
Chinese newspaper slams Philippines, Vietnam for running to US for help
July 18, 2012 by Jerry E. Esplanada
MANILA, Philippines—One of China’s top newspapers has assailed the Philippines and Vietnam for their alleged “attempt to grab islands and waters (in the South China Sea), which don’t belong to them by riding the back of the tiger,” apparently referring to the United States.
The Beijing-based Global Times, in a July 16 report, also said Manila and Hanoi “hope to get massive military assistance from the US, which the US can’t afford to provide.”
The report, titled “Clinton’s trip highlights weak points of US return to Asia,” was written by Liu Zongyi, a research fellow of the Center for South Asia Studies at the Shanghai Institutes for International Studies.
It noted that US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton “made a trip encircling China recently.”
“From Japan to Mongolia then to Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia, Clinton mainly focused on three things: backing Japan, Vietnam and the Philippines in disputes with China over maritime territorial sovereignty, balancing China’s economic influence in Asian by enhancing trade and economic ties with Southeast Asian countries, and promoting support for democracy and human rights as the core of US Asian strategy while attacking China’s development model,” it said.
According to Liu, Clinton’s “every topic targeted China by insinuation. It seems the US is tightening its encirclement of China. But on the other hand, we can see the weakness of the US’ ‘back to Asia’ strategy.”
“The Obama administration’s strategy covers political and military fields, as well as trade and economy. But the strategy seemingly is gradually losing its edge,” said Liu.
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