“Is Vietnam or China legally right in this confrontation?”: According to UNCLOS as has been interpreted by the Permanent Court of Arbitration, the answer is definitely Vietnam, regardless of the answers to the first two questions. After two and a half months of confrontation with Vietnam, on 15/7/2014 China withdrew the billion-dollar oil rig HY-981 […]
Tensions in the South China Sea—scene of naval standoffs in the past year as China has pressed its smaller neighbors on the open sea—may seem far off to many Western investors, but any conflict in the region could affect the global economy. Coast guard vessels from China (rear) and Vietnam in a disputed part of […]
MATTHEW BOULTON, James Watt’s partner in the development of the steam engine and one of the 18th century’s greatest industrialists, was in no doubt about the importance of Britain’s first embassy to the court of the Chinese emperor. “I conceive”, he wrote to James Cobb, secretary of the East India Company, “the present occasion to […]
NEW DELHI: Vietnam has renewed India’s lease of two oil blocks in the South China Sea for another year, on the eve of foreign minister Sushma Swaraj’s first visit to Hanoi next week. The move reaffirms India’s position as a continuing commercial stakeholder in a region where territorial disputes between southeast Asian nations and China […]
China is once again accusing the U.S. pivot of causing the recent tensions in the South China Sea. In the wake of the U.S. and China squaring off over the South China Sea at the ASEAN Regional Forum, Xinhua published a blistering critique of U.S. policy towards the waters. “By stoking the flames,” Xinhua opined, […]
By whatever metric you choose, China’s recent oil-drilling adventure in the South China Sea was a disaster. No new oil will reach Chinese consumers, no new maritime territory has been gained and regional advantage has been handed to the United States. ASEAN solidarity has held firm and the positions of ‘pro-Beijing’ forces in crucial countries, […]
The South China Sea dispute is a contentious issue in the Asia-Pacific region characterised by periodic escalations of tensions, sabre rattling, and often armed conflict. The most recent escalation of tensions occurred as a result of the China National Petroleum Company’s (CNPC) unilateral decision to drill two exploratory oil wells in waters contested by Vietnam […]
Last October, during a visit by Chinese Premier Li Keqiang, Vietnam Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung promised to buttress “political trust” between the two South China Sea (SCS) claimants. Last week, while I was speaking at a conference in Da Nang, Vietnam where the Chinese were visibly absent, verbal accusations were flying both on land […]
Global conflicts are increasingly fuelled by the desire for oil and natural gas and the funds they generate. Iraq, Syria, Nigeria, South Sudan, Ukraine, the East and South China Seas: wherever you look, the world is aflame with new or intensifying conflicts. At first glance, these upheavals appear to be independent events, driven by their […]
South China Sea has emerged as an explosive regional and global flashpoint endangering the security and stability of the wider Indo Pacific region. This arises mainly from China’s propensity to use force to settle territorial disputes. Paracel Islands under full military occupation of China and Spratlys Islands under partial military occupation of China coupled with […]