Thursday, June 6, 2013

China claims 80% of the South China Sea as it's internal Chinese waters

Yesterday, the New York Times reported that China’s mapping authority, Sinomaps Press, issued a new map of the country showing 80% of the South China Sea as internal Chinese water. 
What’s at issue? Each year, more than half of the world’s annual merchant tonnage passes through the South China Sea as well as a third of the global trade in crude oil and over half of LNG trade. 
Beijing’s assertion of sovereignty over that body of water does not necessarily mean it will close the South China Sea off to international commerce. Yet that would be the next step. Given its extremely broad view of its right to regulate coastal traffic, Beijing will undoubtedly define the concept of “innocent passage” narrowly and require vessels entering that sea to obtain its permission beforehand and similarly require aircraft flying over it to do the same. The South China Sea, bordered by eight nations, has long been considered international water.
[...] 
In any event, Beijing’s new map, according to those who have seen it, removes any ambiguity by converting the dashes into a national boundary. All islands and waters inside the line, therefore, are China’s, at least according to the Chinese. It is the biggest attempted grab of territory since World War II.
The new map will roil Asian nations, of course. Last year, Beijing used force to seize Philippine territory, Scarborough Shoal in the South China Sea. The United States, despite its treaty obligations to defend the Philippines, let the Chinese take what they wanted. Nobody in the White House wanted to confront China, and there were voices in the Pentagon saying that China’s aggression served the Philippines right for kicking American forces out of the Clark and Subic bases. Now, the Chinese are going after Ayungin Shoal, long considered Philippine territory...(emphasis mine)
Read the full story HERE.

If you like what you see, please "Like" us on Facebook either here or here.
Please follow us on Twitter here.


2 comments:

BOSMAN said...

THIS IS BIG. Why isn't the news media covering this?

Anonymous said...

Because it has nothing to do with Justin Beiber