The US has urged China and other claimants not to militarize their holdings in the South China Sea.
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Construction are seen on Fiery Cross Reef in the Spratly islands in this June 3, 2016 satellite image released by the Asian Maritime Transparency Initiative at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS).
Former Philippine leader Fidel Ramos said yesterday he would meet contacts with links to Chinese President Xi Jinping during a trip to Hong Kong meant to improve ties between Manila and Beijing.
On July 12, an arbitration court in the Hague ruled that China had no historic title over the busy waterway and had breached the Philippines’ sovereign rights there, infuriating China, which had dismissed the case.
Meanwhile, Japan protested Tuesday over a marked increase in the number of Chinese coast guard and fishing vessels in waters near disputed islands in the East China Sea.
Ramos gave no details of his itinerary or of those he planned to meet, except for Wu Shicun, who heads the National Institute for South China Sea Studies think-tank, based on China’s southern island of Hainan.
China claims most of the South China Sea, through which $5 trillion in ship-borne trade passes every year. “But the rapid construction of reinforced hangars at all three features indicates that this is likely to change”, the CSIS said in a report.
China has repeatedly denied doing so, saying the facilities were for civilian and self-defence use, and in turn criticised United States patrols and exercises for ramping up tensions.
“China has indisputable sovereignty over the Spratly islands and nearby waters”, China’s Defence Ministry said in a faxed response to a request for comment on Tuesday. Besides their size – the smallest hangars are 18.2m to 21.3m wide, more than enough to accommodate China’s largest fighter jets – all show signs of structural strengthening.
“They are far thicker than you would build for any civilian goal”, Mr Gregory Poling, director of the centre’s Asia Maritime Transparency Initiative, said yesterday.
“I think it’s a mistake to take them individually and not look at them as a collective”.
China has denied Philippine fishermen access to traditional grounds lying within the Philippines’ 200-nautical-mile (370-kilometer) exclusive economic zone, an area Ramos implied the countries could share.
Mr Ramos emphasised the long history of exchanges and close relationship between China and the Philippines in culture and people- to-people communication, adding that Chinese people discovered the Philippines more than 100 years before the Europeans did, Xinhua news agency reported yesterday.
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Ties around the region have been strained in the lead-up to and since The Hague ruling. China also says that the islands should be able to defend themselves, and that it is entitled to build whatever structures it wishes on them.
