New China Coast Guard rules yesterday took effect, allowing it to detain foreigners for trespassing in the disputed South China Sea, where neighbors and the G7 have accused Beijing of intimidation and coercion.
Beijing claims almost the entirety of the South China Sea, brushing aside competing claims from nations, including Taiwan and the Philippines, and an international ruling that its stance has no legal basis.
China deploys coast guard vessels and other boats to patrol the waters and has turned several reefs into militarized artificial islands. Chinese and Philippine vessels have had a series of confrontations in disputed areas.
Photo: Reuters
From yesterday, the China Coast Guard can detain foreigners “suspected of violating management of border entry and exit,” according to the new regulations published online.
Detention is allowed for up to 60 days in “complicated cases,” they say, adding that “foreign ships that have illegally entered China’s territorial waters and the adjacent waters may be detained.”
Manila has accused the Chinese coast guard of “barbaric and inhumane behavior” against Philippine vessels, and Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos last month called the new rules a “very worrisome” escalation.
On Friday, Armed Forces of the Philippines Chief of Staff General Romeo Brawner told reporters that authorities in Manila were “discussing a number of steps to be undertaken in order for us to protect our fishermen.”
Philippine fishers were told “not to be afraid, but just to go ahead with their normal activities to fish there in our exclusive economic zone,” Brawner said.
The G7 criticized what it called “dangerous” incursions by China in the waterway.
“We oppose China’s militarization, and coercive and intimidation activities in the South China Sea,” read a G7 statement at the end of a summit on Friday.
The Philippine Department of Foreign Affairs yesterday said that it has asked the UN Commission on the Limits of the Continental Shelf to formally recognize the extent of its undersea shelf in the South China Sea, off western Palawan province, after more than a decade and a half of scientific research.
The undersea region where the Philippines seeks to formally establish its sovereign rights under the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) covers the Spratly Islands (Nansha Islands, 南沙群島), a chain of islands, islets, reefs and atolls that has been fiercely contested over the years by Taiwan, the Philippines, China, Vietnam, Malaysia and Brunei.
“Incidents in the waters tend to overshadow the importance of what lies beneath,” Philippine Ministry of Foreign Affairs Assistant Secretary Marshall Louis Alferez said. “The seabed and the subsoil extending from our archipelago up to the maximum extent allowed by UNCLOS hold significant potential resources that will benefit our nation and our people for generations to come.”
“Today, we secure our future by making a manifestation of our exclusive right to explore and exploit natural resources in our extended continental shelf entitlement,” Alferez said.
Additional reporting by AP
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