China makes South China Sea proposals, slams United States ‘provocation’

China’s Defence Ministry said on Friday that the navy had recently carried out anti-submarine drills in the South China Sea with submarines warships and ship-born helicopters.

The SDF does not engage in regular surveillance activities in the South China Sea at the moment and has no concrete plans to do so, Abe said Sunday at a news conference in Kuala Lumpur.

But China said it would continue to build military and civilian facilities on its artificial islands in the South China Sea.

Only a week ago, two American B-52 strategic bombers flew near Chinese artificial islands in the South China Sea, ignoring calls to leave the area from Beijing’s aviation authorities. Last month, the USS Lassen, a guided-missile destroyer, conducted a patrol around one of the islands.

Shi Yinhong, director of the Center of US Studies at Renmin University of China, said, “As Washington has made a decision to regularly send military ships and planes near Chinese islands, confrontation between China and the United States has reached a record high in the South China Sea”.

Meanwhile, ASEAN issued a joint statement on Saturday stressing the need to maintain navigational freedom and flyover rights within the South China Sea.

On Sunday, US President Barack Obama, who earlier in the week had renewed calls for China to halt attempts to reclaim the islands, said he would host a meeting of the ASEAN leaders in Washington next year.

Mr. Aquino, whose term ends in June, stepped up his attack on China when the 10-nation Asean summit was expanded to include eight major powers-the United States, China, Japan, South Korea, India, Australia, New Zealand and Russian Federation.

He emphasised that Russian air strikes are more effective than those of the US-led coalition because “you can not fight terrorism with air strikes alone”. “We’re not claimants ourselves but we fully support a process in which through global laws and worldwide norms these issues are resolved”, Obama said. “We will take back land they are now in, take out their financing, hunt down leadership, dismantle their networks, supply lines and we will destroy them”.

Lee says he told Obama that all countries in the region appreciate the president’s pivot toward Asia and his regular visits. “There were great concerns expressed by certain countries in respect to what has been done”, he said.

Furthermore, China and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) have agreed to deal with the complicated issue with a dual-track approach: The rows are to be resolved by directly concerned parties through consultation and negotiation, while China and ASEAN members work together to uphold regional peace and stability.