Thursday, October 29, 2015 2:11:48 AM
U.S., Chinese navy chiefs to discuss South China Sea on Thursday
1.5 years ago .. "At least 21 dead in Vietnam anti-China protests over oil rig"
Thu Oct 29, 2015 12:39am EDT
BEIJING/WASHINGTON | By Megha Rajagopalan and Andrea Shalal
Fiery Cross reef, located in the disputed Spratly Islands in the South China Sea, is shown in this handout Center for Strategic and International
Studies (CSIS) Asia Maritime Transparency Initiative satellite image taken September 3, 2015 and released to Reuters October 27,...
Reuters/CSIS Asia Maritime Transparency Initiative/DigitalGlobe/Handout via Reuters
The Chinese and U.S. navies are set to hold high-level talks over tensions in the South China Sea after a U.S. warship challenged Beijing's territorial assertiveness in the disputed waterway this week.
The U.S. chief of naval operations Admiral John Richardson and his Chinese counterpart Admiral Wu Shengli would hold an hourlong video teleconference on Thursday, a U.S. official said.
Both officers initiated the meeting to discuss recent operations in the South China Sea as well as naval ties, the official said. It will be the third such video teleconference between naval chiefs from the United States and China.
Beijing rebuked Washington for sending a guided-missile destroyer within 12 nautical miles of one of China's man-made islands in the Spratly archipelago on Tuesday, saying it had tracked and warned the USS Lassen and called in the U.S. ambassador to protest.
The patrol was the most significant U.S. challenge yet to territorial limits China claims around its artificial islands in one of the world's busiest sea lanes.
"Neither the U.S. nor China desires a military conflict, but the key problem is that the core interests of both sides collide in the South China Sea," said Ni Lexiong, a naval expert at the Shanghai University of Political Science and Law. "It's hard to see either side backing down."
Separately, the English-language China Daily newspaper reported that Admiral Harry Harris, commander of U.S. forces in the Pacific, would visit Beijing next week. It cited an unnamed source and gave no further details.
A U.S. embassy spokesman declined to comment.
Harris has been highly critical of China's island building in the Spratlys. Earlier this year he said China was using dredges and bulldozers to create a "great wall of sand" in the South China Sea.
China rotates a large number of naval and coastguard vessels through the South China Sea, both for patrols and training missions, security experts say.
Chinese state media on Thursday said a "guided-missile destroyer flotilla" under the navy's South China Sea Fleet carried out a "realistic confrontation training exercise" involving anti-aircraft firing and firing at shore at night.
A state-owned news website carried photos from the drills, saying they took place recently in the South China Sea. One photo showed three warships sailing one after the other.
MILITARY EXERCISES
Despite criticism of China's actions in the South China Sea, foreign navies from the United States to Europe have sought to build ties with their Chinese counterparts.
A French frigate docked at China's main South China Sea base of Zhanjiang in the southern province of Guangdong on Wednesday on a four-day visit. It will participate in a maritime exercise about accidental encounters at sea.
Two Australian warships will also hold exercises with the Chinese navy in the South China Sea early next week, Australian Defence Minister Marise Payne said on Thursday.
"There have been no changes or delays to the schedule of the HMAS Arunta and HMAS Stuart since the United States activity in the South China Sea on 27 October 2015," Payne said in a statement that gave no details on the precise location for the exercise.
Australian media said it would include live-fire drills.
Canberra, a key U.S. ally in the region, expressed its strong support for freedom of navigation this week, while stopping short of welcoming the USS Lassen's patrol.
China claims most of the South China Sea, through which more than $5 trillion of world trade passes every year. Vietnam, Malaysia, Brunei, the Philippines and Taiwan have rival claims.
(Reporting by Andrea Shalal in Washington, John Ruwitch in Shanghai, Megha Rajagopalan in Beijing and Lincoln Feast in Sydney; Editing by Dean Yates)
http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/10/29/us-southchinasea-usa-china-idUSKCN0SM2ER20151029
===
White House Moves to Reassure Allies With South China Sea Patrol, but Quietly
By HELENE COOPER and JANE PERLEZ OCT. 27, 2015
[...]
Dangerous Ground
* Since the 18th century, navigators have referred to the Spratlys as “dangerous ground."
* The Philippines, China, Taiwan and Vietnam have all laid claim to the Spratlys.
* China and Taiwan base their claims on Xia and Han dynasty records and a 1947 map made by the Kuomintang.
* The seabed beneath the Spratlys may hold up to 5.4 billion barrels of oil and 55.1 trillion cubic feet of natural gas.
Read more of our coverage from The New York Times Magazine.
http://www.nytimes.com/newsgraphics/2013/10/27/south-china-sea
[...]
The Pentagon said that the Lassen stayed within the 12-nautical-mile border of the Spratly Islands chain for less than an hour, and that American surveillance equipment recorded images.
The Spratly archipelago is closer to the Philippines than to China. Satellite images show that China has built Subi Reef into an island, using huge dredging equipment, and that it has started constructing a runway capable of accommodating military aircraft. It has completed another such runway in the Spratlys, on Fiery Cross Reef, and is working on a third.
[...]
The Lassen operation was intended to show that the United States does not agree that China can prevent American ships from entering a 12-nautical-mile zone that Beijing is claiming around the artificial islands.
The Pentagon apparently chose Subi Reef, which is known as a low-tide elevation, with great care, said Andrew S. Erickson, associate professor at the China Maritime Studies Institute at the United States Naval War College in Rhode Island.
Under the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, a low-tide elevation — one naturally submerged at high tide — is not entitled to a 12-nautical-mile territorial limit, Mr. Erickson said. Beyond a 500-meter safety zone, foreign ships and aircraft are free to operate without consultation or permission, he said.
At the Foreign Ministry on Tuesday, Mr. Lu, the spokesman, said that China had sovereignty over the Spratly chain, and hence claimed the 12-nautical-mile zone.
“China has indisputable sovereignty of the Nansha Islands and adjacent waters,” Mr. Lu said, using China’s name for the Spratlys. He said that China was building in the South China Sea for the “public good.”
Referring to the United States, Mr. Lu said, “If the relevant party keeps stirring things up, it will be necessary for China to speed up its construction activities.”
The Lassen’s patrol came a week before the head of the United States Pacific Command, Adm. Harry B. Harris Jr., is scheduled to hold talks in Beijing with senior Chinese military officials.
Admiral Harris, who has criticized China for moving “walls of sand” to create the artificial islands, has been an outspoken proponent of freedom-of-navigation patrols and has warned that the United States will conduct such forays whenever it sees fit.
Helene Cooper reported from Washington, and Jane Perlez from Beijing. Michael Forsythe
contributed reporting from Hong Kong, and Yufan Huang contributed research from Beijing.
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/10/28/world/asia/south-china-sea-uss-lassen-spratly-islands.html?_r=0
See also:
Philippine Warship in Standoff With Chinese Vessels
2.5 years ago .. http://investorshub.advfn.com/boards/read_msg.aspx?message_id=74251055
1.5 years ago .. "At least 21 dead in Vietnam anti-China protests over oil rig"
Thu Oct 29, 2015 12:39am EDT
BEIJING/WASHINGTON | By Megha Rajagopalan and Andrea Shalal
Fiery Cross reef, located in the disputed Spratly Islands in the South China Sea, is shown in this handout Center for Strategic and International
Studies (CSIS) Asia Maritime Transparency Initiative satellite image taken September 3, 2015 and released to Reuters October 27,...
Reuters/CSIS Asia Maritime Transparency Initiative/DigitalGlobe/Handout via Reuters
The Chinese and U.S. navies are set to hold high-level talks over tensions in the South China Sea after a U.S. warship challenged Beijing's territorial assertiveness in the disputed waterway this week.
The U.S. chief of naval operations Admiral John Richardson and his Chinese counterpart Admiral Wu Shengli would hold an hourlong video teleconference on Thursday, a U.S. official said.
Both officers initiated the meeting to discuss recent operations in the South China Sea as well as naval ties, the official said. It will be the third such video teleconference between naval chiefs from the United States and China.
Beijing rebuked Washington for sending a guided-missile destroyer within 12 nautical miles of one of China's man-made islands in the Spratly archipelago on Tuesday, saying it had tracked and warned the USS Lassen and called in the U.S. ambassador to protest.
The patrol was the most significant U.S. challenge yet to territorial limits China claims around its artificial islands in one of the world's busiest sea lanes.
"Neither the U.S. nor China desires a military conflict, but the key problem is that the core interests of both sides collide in the South China Sea," said Ni Lexiong, a naval expert at the Shanghai University of Political Science and Law. "It's hard to see either side backing down."
Separately, the English-language China Daily newspaper reported that Admiral Harry Harris, commander of U.S. forces in the Pacific, would visit Beijing next week. It cited an unnamed source and gave no further details.
A U.S. embassy spokesman declined to comment.
Harris has been highly critical of China's island building in the Spratlys. Earlier this year he said China was using dredges and bulldozers to create a "great wall of sand" in the South China Sea.
China rotates a large number of naval and coastguard vessels through the South China Sea, both for patrols and training missions, security experts say.
Chinese state media on Thursday said a "guided-missile destroyer flotilla" under the navy's South China Sea Fleet carried out a "realistic confrontation training exercise" involving anti-aircraft firing and firing at shore at night.
A state-owned news website carried photos from the drills, saying they took place recently in the South China Sea. One photo showed three warships sailing one after the other.
MILITARY EXERCISES
Despite criticism of China's actions in the South China Sea, foreign navies from the United States to Europe have sought to build ties with their Chinese counterparts.
A French frigate docked at China's main South China Sea base of Zhanjiang in the southern province of Guangdong on Wednesday on a four-day visit. It will participate in a maritime exercise about accidental encounters at sea.
Two Australian warships will also hold exercises with the Chinese navy in the South China Sea early next week, Australian Defence Minister Marise Payne said on Thursday.
"There have been no changes or delays to the schedule of the HMAS Arunta and HMAS Stuart since the United States activity in the South China Sea on 27 October 2015," Payne said in a statement that gave no details on the precise location for the exercise.
Australian media said it would include live-fire drills.
Canberra, a key U.S. ally in the region, expressed its strong support for freedom of navigation this week, while stopping short of welcoming the USS Lassen's patrol.
China claims most of the South China Sea, through which more than $5 trillion of world trade passes every year. Vietnam, Malaysia, Brunei, the Philippines and Taiwan have rival claims.
(Reporting by Andrea Shalal in Washington, John Ruwitch in Shanghai, Megha Rajagopalan in Beijing and Lincoln Feast in Sydney; Editing by Dean Yates)
http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/10/29/us-southchinasea-usa-china-idUSKCN0SM2ER20151029
===
White House Moves to Reassure Allies With South China Sea Patrol, but Quietly
By HELENE COOPER and JANE PERLEZ OCT. 27, 2015
[...]
Dangerous Ground
* Since the 18th century, navigators have referred to the Spratlys as “dangerous ground."
* The Philippines, China, Taiwan and Vietnam have all laid claim to the Spratlys.
* China and Taiwan base their claims on Xia and Han dynasty records and a 1947 map made by the Kuomintang.
* The seabed beneath the Spratlys may hold up to 5.4 billion barrels of oil and 55.1 trillion cubic feet of natural gas.
Read more of our coverage from The New York Times Magazine.
http://www.nytimes.com/newsgraphics/2013/10/27/south-china-sea
[...]
The Pentagon said that the Lassen stayed within the 12-nautical-mile border of the Spratly Islands chain for less than an hour, and that American surveillance equipment recorded images.
The Spratly archipelago is closer to the Philippines than to China. Satellite images show that China has built Subi Reef into an island, using huge dredging equipment, and that it has started constructing a runway capable of accommodating military aircraft. It has completed another such runway in the Spratlys, on Fiery Cross Reef, and is working on a third.
[...]
The Lassen operation was intended to show that the United States does not agree that China can prevent American ships from entering a 12-nautical-mile zone that Beijing is claiming around the artificial islands.
The Pentagon apparently chose Subi Reef, which is known as a low-tide elevation, with great care, said Andrew S. Erickson, associate professor at the China Maritime Studies Institute at the United States Naval War College in Rhode Island.
Under the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, a low-tide elevation — one naturally submerged at high tide — is not entitled to a 12-nautical-mile territorial limit, Mr. Erickson said. Beyond a 500-meter safety zone, foreign ships and aircraft are free to operate without consultation or permission, he said.
At the Foreign Ministry on Tuesday, Mr. Lu, the spokesman, said that China had sovereignty over the Spratly chain, and hence claimed the 12-nautical-mile zone.
“China has indisputable sovereignty of the Nansha Islands and adjacent waters,” Mr. Lu said, using China’s name for the Spratlys. He said that China was building in the South China Sea for the “public good.”
Referring to the United States, Mr. Lu said, “If the relevant party keeps stirring things up, it will be necessary for China to speed up its construction activities.”
The Lassen’s patrol came a week before the head of the United States Pacific Command, Adm. Harry B. Harris Jr., is scheduled to hold talks in Beijing with senior Chinese military officials.
Admiral Harris, who has criticized China for moving “walls of sand” to create the artificial islands, has been an outspoken proponent of freedom-of-navigation patrols and has warned that the United States will conduct such forays whenever it sees fit.
Helene Cooper reported from Washington, and Jane Perlez from Beijing. Michael Forsythe
contributed reporting from Hong Kong, and Yufan Huang contributed research from Beijing.
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/10/28/world/asia/south-china-sea-uss-lassen-spratly-islands.html?_r=0
See also:
Philippine Warship in Standoff With Chinese Vessels
2.5 years ago .. http://investorshub.advfn.com/boards/read_msg.aspx?message_id=74251055
It was Plato who said, “He, O men, is the wisest, who like Socrates, knows that his wisdom is in truth worth nothing”
Join the InvestorsHub Community
Register for free to join our community of investors and share your ideas. You will also get access to streaming quotes, interactive charts, trades, portfolio, live options flow and more tools.
