Japanese Foreign Minister Fumio Kishida, left, meets Chinese Ambassador to Japan Cheng Yonghua at foreign ministry in Tokyo Tuesday, Aug. 9, 2016.
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Recent satellite photographs show China appears to have built reinforced aircraft hangars on its holdings in the Spratly Islands in the disputed South China Sea, the New York Times reported on Monday.
China says it wants to turn a page on the arbitration ruling through bilateral talks with other claimants, although the U.S., Philippines and others resist that.
China claims nearly the entire South China Sea, through which more than $5 trillion of trade moves annually.
China asserts sovereignty over nearly all of the strategically vital waters in the face of rival claims from its Southeast Asian neighbors.
The move comes after repeated protests by Japanese foreign ministry officials since Friday over what Tokyo calls “intrusions” by Chinese ships in the territorial and contiguous waters of the rocky islands.
A USA guided-missile destroyer pulled into port in Qingdao on Monday for the first Navy port call to China since an worldwide tribunal ruled that many of Beijing’s claims to the South China Sea were invalid.
China also claims the islands, which it calls the Diaoyu, the Associated Press reports. China argued that the islands in the East China Sea, which are claimed by both the countries, are integral part of China and are strategically located and the dispute should be resolved through proper dialogue.
Japan also lodged a complaint with China over military surface radar and monitoring cameras spotted on China’s gas-drilling platforms in the East China Sea.
China has claimed that the construction on the Spratly islands and reefs is “multipurpose, mixed, and with the exception of necessary military defensive requirements.more for serving all forms of civil needs”.
Last month, China participated in Rim of the Pacific, or RIMPAC, a training exercise in conjunction with the USA and 24 other countries held in Hawaii and off the coast of Southern California.
The court said China violated the Philippines’ rights to explore its exclusive economic zone by constructing facilities on the Mischief Reef. Last week, Yang Yujun, a spokesman for the China Defense Ministry said the land and sea exercises will be “routine” and will not “target any third party”.
China’s 2012 seizure of the Scarborough Shoal, denying Philippine fishermen access, was among the factors that prompted Manila to seek arbitration by the global court.
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South Korea’s presidential office on Sunday rebuked China over its criticism of South Korea’s decision to deploy the anti-missile defence, urging China instead to play a stronger role against North Korea’s provocations.
