Fueled by China’s growing assertiveness as a rising global power, tensions over territorial disputes have mounted in the Asia-Pacific region. In November last year, Beijing unilaterally expanded its Air Defense Identification Zone (ADIZ) to cover most of the East China Sea, triggering a bitter dispute with Tokyo as the ADIZ also covers the airspace above […]
(Reuters) – Taiwan is building a $100 million port next to an airstrip on the lone island it occupies in the disputed South China Sea, a move that is drawing hardly any flak from the most assertive player in the bitterly contested waters – China. The reason, say military strategists, is that Itu Aba could […]
The No. 9 Design & Research Institute of China State Shipbuilding Corporation recently displayed on its official website its proposed design of an artificial island to be built on a reef in the South China Sea. It aims at providing a reserve of designs for an artificial island China may build there. On the website, […]
WHILE the United States, with the pivot to Asia, is testing China’s capability to handle diplomatic challenges in ties with its neighbourhood, it is carrying out the strategy increasingly at the expense of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) by driving wider the rifts among members of the regional bloc. Should the ASEAN nations […]
IN agreeing to a strategic partnership with Vietnam, Defense Secretary Voltaire Gazmin admitted that the Philippines is interested in enhanced intelligence exchange and inter-operability with Hanoi, but stressed that such an arrangement is not necessarily aimed at any third country. “On the defense front, our objective is closer information sharing and inter-operability in the region,” […]
VietNamNet: China’s unruly actions have spurred domestic and international public opinion to believe that it is time for us to sue China in the international court of justice. What is your thought about this? Ngo Huu Phuoc: I do not oppose this plan. However, I believe that in the current situation, as well as based […]
Adrien Morin contends that China’s foreign policy is consistently non-assertive toward Western power, basing this on its policy throughout the Syrian crises. While Mr. Morin’s thesis on consistency may find support in China’s position on non-interventionism in Syria, it falls apart in his attempted extrapolation to the South China Sea. Despite any perception within China […]
As China brings in a $1 billion oil exploration rig, parking it in a disputed region of the South China Sea and unleashing a deadly anti-China protest in Vietnam, nearby Southeast Asian neighbors appear relatively mute and impotent. Burma (also known as Myanmar), which hosted the meeting of the 10-nation Association of Southeast Asian Nations, […]
Ngo Huu Phuoc: China’s behavior has violated the 1982 UN Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) and the basic principles of international law on friendly relations between countries that are prescribed in the UN Charter and codified in the Declaration of the UN General Assembly, dated 24/10/1970. Under the provisions of the UNCLOS, […]
This is what China is planning to construct on our Mabini Reef. If they succeed in doing this, it would become an unsinkable aircraft carrier, a game changer. From there, Chinese fighter planes can reach in minutes all our vital military and economic installations, a clear and present danger, like the Cuban missile installations, to […]