China maintains its stance on borders

Mainland analysts see little immediate chance for an easing of tensions now roiling across N o r t h e a s t Asia, saying a rising China is showing it is keen to shape its own battlefield despite fresh threats. “This action is China saying to the world that it has the ability to fight two regional conflicts on its doorstep,” said Ni Lexiong, a naval expert at the Shanghai University of Political Science and Law. 

“If is actively making provocations in our South China Sea, then in the East China Sea, on its doorway, it will face a little pressure,” Ni said. Beijing’s claims to much of the South China Sea were invalidated last month in an emphatic ruling by an arbitration court in The Hague in a case brought by rival claimant, the Philippines. The region’s deepening fault lines after the ruling were exposed at the weekend as a fleet of Chinese coast guard and fishing vessels sailed near Japanese-controlled islets in the East China Sea. Japan warned China today ties were “deteriorating markedly.” 

Tokyo worries that Chinese control of the South China Sea, through which much of the oil it imports is shipped, threatens its national security and takes Beijing a step closer to extending its influence into the Western Pacific.