China Sends Fighter Jets To Contested Island In South China Sea

The United States has denounced China for what it calls the “militarization” of the South China Sea.

Earlier Tuesday, the head of the US military’s Pacific Command said China is “clearly militarizing” the South China Sea, in testimony before the Senate Armed Services Committee.

Washington’s allies could soon join the US military in sending naval ships and warplanes near China’s now-militarized man made islands in the South China Sea, the top American commander in the Pacific said.

The images emerged only days after the U.S. and Taiwan said China appeared to have deployed surface-to-air missiles on another island, prompting a blunt response from Beijing’s Ministry of Defence, which said in a blog that China had established “necessary defence facilities” in the region that were “legal and appropriate”.

This follows several “militarization” actions by China in the region, which it claims control of, in competition with several other Asian nations including Vietnam and the Philippines. And any defensive facilities practiced on the islands are a mere exercise of self-defense as allowed in worldwide law, says Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying.

Observing that the stakes for the United States are not insignificant, Earnest said America would want to ensure that the freedom of navigation and the free flow of commerce in the South China Sea is protected.

“I would like to tell you important progress has been made in the consultations and we are looking at the possibility of reaching agreement on a draft resolution and passing it in the near future”, Wang said, while Kerry hailed “significant progress”.

Wang also urged the U.S.to conduct peace talks with the North concurrently with denuclearization talks.

Already this month, the US has taken tougher steps of its own against North Korea, tightening sanctions and announcing it will hold formal talks with its close ally South Korea on deploying a missile defense system that China fears could be used against it as well North Korea.

China on Wednesday complained the media were ignoring radars and weapons deployed by other claimants in the South China Sea, and unfairly targeting China, following reports of its deployment of fighter jets and radars in the disputed waterway.

“So that’s why we’re seeking to reduce tensions and encouraging all sides to come together to resolve their differences in a way that does not provoke a military confrontation”, he said.

When asked about the radar issue in the South China Sea, Wang Yi says China is now facing the fact that advanced armaments and equipment are emerging every day in the area.

He said militarisation was not the responsibility of one party alone, an apparent reference to USA patrols.

“We don’t hope to see any more close-up military reconnaissance, or the dispatch of missile destroyers or strategic bombers to the South China Sea”, he said. Much of the discord stemmed from Chinese efforts to use land reclamation to build artificial islands in the Spratly Islands chain, south of the Paracels.

China last night reaffirmed its right to self-defence and refuted USA charges as “hyping with ulterior motives”, the official Xinhua news agency reported.