Category: China

Redefining the Status Quo

The most striking feature of China’s behavior in its maritime disputes this year has been efforts to redefine the status quo.  In its disputes with the Philippines and Japan, China has used the presence of its civilian maritime law enforcement agencies to create new facts on the water to strengthen China’s sovereignty claims.

Before April 2012, neither China nor the Philippines maintained a permanent presence at Scarborough Shoal.  Fishermen from the Philippines, Vietnam, Taiwan and China operated in and around the large reef.  At times in the past, especially in the late 1990s and early 2000s, the Philippine navy had arrested Chinese fishermen who were inside the shoal.  Since then, Chinese patrols have sailed by the shoal, but no effort has been undertaken to exercise effective control over the shoal or its surrounding waters.

The situation changed following the standoff over sovereignty of Scarborough Shoal.  The standoff began in April 2012 when the Philippine navy prepared to arrest Chinese fishermen who were operating in the shoal’s lagoon.  After receiving a distress call, two China Marine Surveillance (CMS) vessels arrived on the scene, blocking the entrance to the lagoon and preventing the arrest of the Chinese fishermen.  After the fishing boats left the shoal, however, government ships from both sides remained to defend claims to sovereignty over the shoal.  By the end of May, China had deployed as many as seven CMS and Bureau of Fisheries Administration ships.

In early June, the Philippines announced that an agreement had been reached with China for a mutual withdrawal of ships.  Although China never publicly confirmed the existence of such an agreement, ships from both sides left in mid June as a typhoon approached the area.  Later, however, Chinese ships returned and appear have maintained a permanent presence in the waters around the shoal since then.  In mid July 2012, for example, an intrepid news crew from Al Jazeera videotaped an attempt to visit the shoal, only to be turned away by a combination of CMS and fisheries administration vessels.  China has also roped off the sole entrance to the lagoon inside the shoal to control access to it.

Before the standoff, China had no permanent presence at Scarborough Shoal.  Three months later, China had effective control of the shoal and the surrounding waters, thereby altering the status quo in this dispute in its favor.  As an editorial in the Global Times noted, China has “directly consolidated control” of the shoal.

A similar dynamic is underway in the East China Sea over the Senkaku / Diaoyu Islands.  Before the Japanese government’s purchase of three of the islets from a private citizen in September 2012, Chinese government ships had generally avoided entering the 12 nautical mile limit of Japan’s territorial waters around the islands.  As I wrote several years ago, China and Japan appeared to have a tacit agreement from the mid-2000s to limit the presence of ships and citizens near the islands in an effort to manage the potential for escalation.

In September 2010, the detention of a Chinese fishing captain whose boat had broached the 12 nautical mile limit and then rammed a Japanese Coast Guard ship sparked a crisis in China-Japan relations.  Part of China’s response included increasing the number of patrols by marine surveillance and fisheries vessels near the islands.  Most of the time, these boats remained beyond Japan’s 12 nautical mile territorial waters around the Senkakus or crossed this line only briefly.  China in practical terms continued to accept Japanese de facto control of the islands and their associated territorial waters (over which a state enjoys sovereignty rights under the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea).

After the purchase of the islands last month, however, China has abandoned this approach. China firstissued baselines to claim its own territorial waters around the islands and then began to conduct almost daily patrols within its newly-claimed waters – directly challenging the Japanese control that it had largely accepted before.  The purpose of the patrols is two-fold: to demonstrate that the purchase of the islands will not affect China’s sovereignty claims and to challenge Japan’s position that there is no dispute over the sovereignty of the islands.

Although China does not control the waters around the Senkakus (unlike the situation at Scarborough), it no longer accepts de facto Japanese control.  On October 31, a Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesmanasserted that a new status quo had been created.  After describing China’s new patrols as “routine,” Hong Lai stated that “the Japanese side should face squarely the reality that a fundamental change has already occurred in the Diaoyu Islands.”

In both cases, China responded to challenges to its claims with an enhanced physical presence to bolster China’s position and deter any further challenges.  These responses suggest an even greater willingness to pursue unilateral actions to advance its claims.  In neither case is a return to the status quo ante likely.

[This originally appeared in The Diplomat.]

The Dangerous Math of Chinese Island Disputes

Today, I published a piece in the Asian Wall Street Journal on the current standoff between China and Japan over the Senkaku Islands.

Reviewing China’s behavior in its past territorial disputes, I argue that the danger of escalation is much greater than is commonly believed.

The piece can be viewed here.  You can also email me for an off-print.

PS — The origin title was “Danger in the East China Sea.”

Something to Talk About, Again

Earlier, I wrote about why China believes that a past consensus existed with Japan over deferring resolution of the dispute over the Senkaku/Diaoyu Islands.  A colleague recently alerted me to a new Chinese source that further illuminates the discussion of the issue during the talks on normalizing diplomatic relations in 1972 between Kakuei Tanaka and Zhou Enlai.

The source is a recollection of the talkswritten by Zhang Xiangshan (张香山).  Having studied in Japan before 1949, Zhang served as an advisor to Zhou Enlai on Sino-Japanese relations in the 1970s.  Zhang’s recollection is a credible source, as it was published fourteen years ago in an article in a Chinese academic journal, Japanese Studies (日本学刊) – well before the current escalation of tensions.

According to Zhang Xiangshan, Tanaka and not Zhou raised the issue at the end of their third meeting in September 1972.  Tanaka asked Zhou about China’s attitude was toward the islands.  Zhou responded that he “did not want to discuss the issue at this time, as it would not be useful (没好处).”

Tanaka pressed further, stating that “it would create some difficulties” if he returned to Japan without mentioning the islands.  Zhou replied that “because oil had been discovered in the ocean there, Taiwan had made [the islands] into a big issue, now the United States is also making them into an issue.”

Tanaka: “Okay!  There’s no need to talk about it, we can discuss it later.”

Zhou: “Let’s talk discuss it later.  Now we should grasp the basic issues that we can settle, such as first resolving the normalization of relations.  This is the most urgent issue.  Other problems should be discussed after some time has passed.”

Tanaka: “Once diplomatic relations are normalized, I believe that other problems can be resolved.”

Why does this exchange between Chinese and Japanese leaders from 1972 matter?  At the moment, China and Japan have staked out irreconcilable positions over the Senkaku/Diaoyu Islands.  China wants acknowledgement of the “common ground reached between the two sides.”  Japan maintains no dispute exists and thus there is nothing to discuss, including any past exchanges on the islands in the 1970s.

Yet the Tanaka-Zhou talks suggest a way out.  Japan could acknowledge that the islands had been discussed and deferred without altering its claim to them.  China could view such as statement as acknowledging the past “common ground.”  Both sides could move on.  As Doug Paal suggests, if China rejected such a Japanese statement, then the “onus shifts to China” to de-escalate the situation.

 

[This post originally appeared in The Diplomat.]

Something to Talk About in the East China Sea

The diplomatic stand off between China and Japan over the Senkaku / Diaoyu Islands has entered its third week without any signs of de-escalation.  Positions on both sides have hardened.  Each government has released detailed accounts of the bases for their claims (, ).  Talks earlier in the week between diplomats in Beijing yielded only an agreement to keep talking.  The atmosphere of a meeting in New York between foreign ministers Yang Jiechi and Koichiro Gemba was described as “.”

The  issued by China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs contained China’s key demand at the moment.  It stated that Japan should “come back to the very understanding and common ground reached between the two sides” and “return to the track of negotiated settlement of the dispute.”

What does this mean?  China believes that in talks with Japanese officials involving Zhou Enlai and Deng Xiaoping, agreements or understandings were reached that the islands were disputed but that any effort to resolve their conflicting positions would be deferred to achieve more pressing tasks, especially the normalization of relations in 1972 and the conclusion of a peace treaty in 1978.

Japan’s position, however, is that there is nothing to discuss.  As Prime Minister Noda , “So far as the Senkaku Islands are concerned, they are an inherent part of our territory, in light of history and international law. It’s very clear. There are no territorial issues as such, therefore there could not be any compromise that may mean any set back from this basic position.”

Such a position – denial of a dispute – is not uncommon in conflicts over territory.  When one side controls all of the territory being contested, it often states that there is no dispute.  South Korea, for example, claims that there is no dispute over the Dokdo / Takeshima Islands, which are also claimed by Japan.  Likewise,  that there is no dispute over the Paracel archipelago, which Vietnam claims.

Why, then, does China believe that there is something to talk about?  Documentary evidence is scant.  Neither side has released transcripts of meetings between leaders when the islands were discussed.  Nevertheless, authoritative party history sources from China sources reveal why Beijing maintains that there was a shared understanding in the past.

In 1972, Zhou Enlai and Takeiri Yoshikazu (leader of the Komeito party) appeared to agree orally not to discuss the Senkakus in talks that would be held to normalize relations between the two countries.  In , Seton Hall scholar  cites a collection of documents on Chinese-Japanese relations: in July 1972, Zhou told Takeiri, “There is no need to mention the Diaoyu Islands. It does not count a problem of any sort compared to recovering normal relations [between the two countries].”   A  earlier this month contains a similar account.  Thus, from China’s point of view, the decision not to discuss the dispute at the time was a recognition that a dispute did exist.

Similarly, in 1978, Deng Xiaoping and the Japanese Foreign Minister also appeared to agree orally not to discuss the Senkakus at a later time.  A  of Deng’s activities published by a  summarizes a meeting between Deng and Foreign Minister Sunao Sonoda.  According to the book, Deng stated: “It’s not that China and Japan do not have any problems. For example [there are] the Diaoyu Island and continental shelf issues. Don’t drag them in now, they can be set aside to be calmly discussed later and we can slowly reach a way that both sides can accept. If our generation cannot find a way, the next generation or the one after that will find a way.”

(The original Chinese is: “?????????????? ???????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????”)

To be clear, these Chinese source materials only show why China maintains that an understanding existed in the past.  Full transcripts of these meetings have not been released.  How Takeiri and Sonoda responded to Zhou and Deng is unknown.  Nevertheless, they appear to acknowledge the presence of a dispute.  At the same time, there’s no record that Zhou or Deng contested directly Japan’s actual control of the islands then, either.

Other parties, notably the United States, also view the islands as disputed.  The United States recognizes Japan’s administration of the islands, which it transferred in 1972, and that the islands fall under the mutual defense treaty.  Nevertheless, as both Secretary of State Hilary Clinton and Secretary of Defense Panetta have , “the United States doesn’t take a position on competing sovereignty claims” over the islands.  Moreover, the U.S. position on the dispute is not new.  Before the transfer, the State Department’s  was that “the U.S. passes no judgment as to conflicting claims over any portion of them, which should be settled directly by the parties concerned.”

At the moment, China and Japan stand at a diplomatic impasse.  Yet China’s September 10 statement retains sufficient ambiguity for creative diplomats to define the “common ground” between the two sides in order to restore stability in the dispute.  For example, Japan could state that although its sovereignty over the islands is “indisputable,” it recognizes that, in practice, other claims exist.  If China and Japan want to move forward, they will need to find a way to shelve the dispute again.

[This originally appeared in .]

Drawing Lines in the Water

In the past few days, China has launched a broad and well coordinated media campaign to express opposition to the Japanese government’s purchase of three of the While tensions rise between Japan and China in the East China Sea, an important development may have been overlooked.

(Diaoyu) Islands from a private Japanese citizen.  The campaign has included remarks by almost every member of the Politburo standing committee, an authoritative statement by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and semi-authoritative commentaries in official media sources such as thePeople’s Daily, PLA Daily, and Xinhua.

Nevertheless, amid all the expressions of indignation, one of the most important elements of China’s response has been overlooked: agovernment statement announcing baselines to demarcate China’s territorial sea around the disputed islands.  Under the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea, a state enjoys the equivalent of territorial sovereignty within this zone, which extends 12 nautical miles seaward of the baselines that a state declares.

When China first declared its baselines in 1996, it did not publish base points for three areas that were under dispute: the Spratly Islands in the South China Sea, Taiwan, and the Senkakus.  China did draw baselines around the Paracel Islands, which Vietnam claims, but likely did so because it had controlled the entire archipelago for several decades.

At first glance, the announcement of baselines around the Senkakus might just be a symbolic declaration of sovereignty that will not change any facts on the ground.  Although China could not prevent the sale of the islands, the media campaign has emphasized that this act does not alter China’s claims, a point that the baselines underscore.

Nevertheless, beyond re-affirming China’s claims, the announcement of baselines may matter for several reasons.  First, from China’s perspective, it establishes a legal basis for China’s claim to jurisdiction not just over the islands but also, more importantly, over the waters around the islands.  On September 13, China submitted its baselines to the United Nations in accordance with UNCLOS.

Second, as a result, it creates a rationale for an increased Chinese presence around the islands.  The importance of this rationale was revealed on September 14, when the Ministry of Foreign Affairs announced that two task forces with a total of six ships from the China Marine Surveillance Force had been dispatched to the waters near islands to “defend our maritime rights and interests.”

Third, a struggle between Chinese and Japanese government ships may occur to control the 12 nautical mile territorial sea around the islands.  In the past, Chinese vessels have usually respected this line, though it has occasionally been crossed temporarily to underscore China’s claims.  If cooler heads fail to prevail, however, the increased number of ships in the area, seeking to exercise control over the territorial sea around the islands, could spiral out of control in ways that neither country wants.  Hopefully cooler heads will prevail.

[This originally appeared in The Diplomat.]

The Perils of Predicting Chinese Politics

In recent weeks, rumors  about the outcome of the 18thCongress of the Chinese Communist Party—expected in a month or two—and the composition of such key leadership bodies as the next Politburo Standing Committee, .  At the moment, conventional wisdom holds that its membership will be reduced from nine to seven, with the crucial portfolio for law and order handed down to a Politburo member who does not sit on the smaller standing committee.

Nevertheless, predicting the outcome of elite political bargaining in China is perhaps as messy as the backroom negotiations themselves.  To illustrate the difficulty of such predictions, consider what happened before the  back in 2002 at the 16th Party Congress.

That summer, two respected scholars,  and ,  that predicted precisely who would be placed on the standing committee, their protocol (or rank) order, and what positions they would hold.  They based their forecast on internal party dossiers about the candidates that had been leaked to a writer in Hong Kong.

Looking back, the accuracy of these predictions can now be assessed.

First, Nathan and Gilley were wrong about the total: the standing committee selected in 2002 was enlarged to nine rather than kept at seven.

Second, Nathan and Gilley were correct about only five of the nine individuals who made the team.  The most important omission was Li Ruihuan, who they predicted would be promoted to the number two slot in the protocol order but in fact was not named to the Politburo Standing Committee at all.   They also missed the additions of Jia Qinglin, Huang Ju and Wu Guangzheng, who gained spots numbers four, six, and seven.

Third, perhaps most importantly, Nathan and Gilley correctly predicted only the portfolios of three members.  And two of these were easy and no surprise to anyone:   of the Chinese Communist Party and president of the country while .  They also predicted correctly that Zeng Qinghong, then a long-time advisor to outgoing President Jiang Zemin, would head the party secretariat, its ruling bureaucracy.  Nevertheless, Wu Bangguo wound up as chairman of the National People’s Congress (not the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference as they expected), Luo Gan headed the CCP’s political and legislative affairs committee (not the Central Disciplinary Inspection Committee), and Li Changchun got the commission on building the “spiritual culture” of socialism (not the Executive Vice Premiership).

The point is not to pick on Nathan and Gilley.  After all, they were bold enough to publish clear predictions, which were re-examined in a revised edition of their book.  They also noted correctly that other individuals , Li Keqiang, and  great potential for becoming important leaders in 2012. Moreover, their predictions may have been as accurate as possible for outsiders at the time the materials were received and the book written.  Nevertheless, the real-life selection of top Chinese leaders requires a great deal of internal party bargaining and often may not be confirmed before the congress actually opens.

A decade later, scholars and analysts have much greater access to sources of information about Chinese politics.  Nevertheless, the process itself remains opaque, not just to outsiders but also to most Chinese citizens and even party members.  As a result, although a few winners of places on the next Politburo Standing Committee are well-known, all predictions about China’s next leaders and their exact responsibilities should be treated with caution.  As for me, I’ll wait until the congress makes its official announcements.

[This originally appeared in .]

Much Ado About The Sansha Garrison

In June, Beijing raised the “administrative status of the Xisha, Zhongsha and Nansha islands” from a county-level administrative office to prefectural-level city named Sansha based on Woody (Yongxing) Island in the Paracels (Xisha) archipelago in the South China Sea. In July, the People’s Liberation Army (PLA)  garrison in the newly created city also based on Woody Island.

Analysts and pundits have viewed the announcement of the new garrison with alarm.   viewed the decision as “a sign of [China’s] growing reliance on hard power” in the South China Sea.  equated the announcement with a decision to create “a permanent forward-deployed military force within striking distance of such contested waters,” a view echoed by the .  Still  a division of at least 6,000 soldiers would be deployed to the region and that the garrison might command units from the PLA Air Force and Navy.

Such conclusions, however, are misplaced.  In particular, they misunderstand the role of garrisons(jingbeiqu, also called garrison commands or garrison headquarters) in the PLA and how China has organized the defense of the islands and reefs it controls in the South China Sea.  From a military perspective, the significance of Sansha garrison should not be overstated.  Alone, it will not lead to an increase in combat units in the region nor does it portend a new effort by China to militarize the disputes in the South China Sea.

In the PLA, division-level military garrisons do not command main force combat units such as infantry or armored divisions or brigades.  They also do not command PLA Navy or PLA Air Force units.  Instead, as described in China’s , garrisons and other division-level military sub-districts (junfenqu, also called prefectural military commands) are administrative headquarters established in major cities responsible for supporting the military work conducted by the municipality, such as conscription and national defense mobilization tasks. Garrisons and military sub-districts fall under provincial-level military districts (shengjunqu) and are jointly commanded by the municipality’s party committee and government. As with division-level units, they are headed by Army senior colonels, who are assisted by a handful of staff officers. Depending on their location, garrisons and military sub-districts may command PLA border defense units (up to regimental size) that share responsibility with civilian public security forces (gong’an budui) for guarding China’s borders and providing early warning of an attack.

By our count, the PLA now has about 39 division-level garrisons and nearly another 300 military sub-district headquarters throughout China. In addition, there are four corps-level garrisons in the centrally administered cities of Beijing, Tianjin, Shanghai, and Chongqing, and the Hong Kong and Macau Garrisons, which report directly to Central Military Commission. Comparatively speaking, at the same organizational level, the PLA Army currently has only about 31 infantry and armored combat divisions (though the number of combat brigades one step below a division has increased to roughly 50).  The PLA has far more division-level organizations than combat-ready divisions.  Thus, by itself, the establishment of division-level garrison such as the one for Sansha does not suggest the deployment of large numbers of forces.

In short, create a city or other prefectural-level administrative unit in China and a garrison or military sub-district will often be established as well.  The Sansha garrison is merely the newest among hundreds of division-level organizations in the entire PLA.  noted that the new garrison had been upgraded from People’s Armed Forces Department (wuzhuangbu) that was part of the previous county-level administrative office.  Moreover, consistent with the 2006 white paper, the Ministry of Defense spokesman stated that the  were “defense mobilization… city guard, support for the city’s disaster rescue and relief work, and [direction of] militia and reserve troops.”

So far, no border defense units have been assigned to the Sansha garrison.  Instead, the existing Xisha (Paracels) maritime garrison under the PLAN’s South Sea Fleet is responsible for the actual defense of the islands in the South China Sea under China’s control.  The Paracels maritime garrison is one of six division-level maritime garrisons (shuijingqu) that fall under the command of one of the three regional fleets in the PLA Navy.  Maritime garrisons are responsible for conducting defensive operations (fangwei zuozhan) in their designated area and may command PLAN combat units.

Although it is not clear when the Paracels maritime garrison was established, reports of the unit first appeared in the Chinese press in 1985.  Nevertheless, China’s deployment of troops to the South China Sea began almost three decades earlier, in the 1950s when the PLA occupied Woody Island in the Amphitrite Group of the Paracels.  Following several confrontations with South Vietnamese forces in the Crescent Group of the Paracels in the mid-1950s, Premier Zhou Enlai in 1959 instructed the PLA to establish a base on Woody Island and in 1960 regular patrols around the Paracels were initiated.  In 1971, the PLAN began to upgrade and expand the infrastructure in the Paracels, which has continued steadily until to the present day and includes a military-capable airfield built over 20 years ago. To date, there has been little to no evidence that the airfield has been used to accommodate “a permanent forward-deployed military force within striking distance of such contested waters.”

The Xisha maritime garrison is commanded by a senior captain (equivalent to an Army senior colonel), the former head of the PLAN’s 1st Marine Brigade, a main force combat unit in the South Sea Fleet.  The number of troops in the maritime garrison is unknown, but a 2002 report from Taiwan stated that China has deployed around 590 troops on the features in controls in the Spratlys (while Vietnam had around 2020).  The Ministry of Defense spokesman stating, “the Sansha military garrison and Xisha maritime garrison are separate military organs executing duties according to their respective responsibilities… the Xisha maritime garrison… is responsible for maritime defense and military combat.”

What, then, is the significance of the establishment of the Sansha garrison?  First, from a military perspective, it is a minor development.  It likely will not command any combat units nor will it result in a substantial increase in the Chinese forces in the South China Sea.  Rather, it is designed to enhance coordination with the local government.  Its importance is political, part of what  unabashedly described as China’s effort, “to display its sovereignty over the South China Sea.”

Second, because the PLA has maintained a military presence on the features it holds in the South China Sea for decades, the creation of the garrison  about  of the PLA in Chinese foreign policy or policy in the South China Sea. Instead, the establishment of the garrison reflects the bureaucratic upgrade of an existing department following a change in the administrative status of the associated locality.

Third, militarily, any forces on the islands and reefs in the South China Sea are vulnerable and hard to defend. As retired U.S. , “Putting garrisons on Woody Island or elsewhere in the Paracels would effectively maroon these guys, so the only advantage would be just showing the flag — to say, ‘We are serious.’”

Finally, the general reaction to the creation of the Sansha garrison reflects the limited understanding among analysts and observers of the PLA’s organization despite Beijing’s efforts to describe the structure of the Chinese armed forces in biannual white papers and media reports. For example, none of the Pentagon’s annual reports to Congress on Chinese military power  this level of organization.  In the case of Sansha, the Chinese government could have better explained its decision, while commentators might have examined what garrisons actually do before jumping to ill-founded conclusions.

[This piece was co-authored with Dennis J. Blasko and originally appeared on .]

Overlapping Claims and Major Powers

Yesterday, the head of PetroVietnam, Vietnam’s state-owned oil company, gave a briefing in response to CNOOC’s announcement of new blocks in the South China Sea.

The briefing included a map, shown below, which indicates the extent to which China’s blocks overlap with Vietnam’s.  It also shows which foreign oil companies are targeted by CNOOC’s announcement — Gazprom, ONGC, and ExxonMobil.

In other words, China is challenging three major powers with interests in the region — Russia, India and the United States.

China wants to avoid internationalizing the dispute, but CNOOC’s act is sure to achieve the opposite result by clearly engaging the interests of other powers.

The South China Sea Oil Card

Over the weekend, the China National Offshore Oil Company (CNOOC) quietly announced that nine new blocks in the South China Sea were now open to foreign oil companies for exploration and development.  This move reflects one of the starkest efforts by China to assert its maritime rights in these disputed waters – and constitutes a direct challenge to Vietnam’s own claims.

Unlike the blocks that CNOOC offered in2010 and 2011, the new ones are located entirely within disputed waters in the South China Sea.  As this map shows, the new blocks lie off Vietnam’s central coast and comprise of more than 160,000 square kilometers. The western edge of some blocks appear to be less than 80 nautical miles from Vietnam’s coast, well within that country’s Exclusive Economic Zone. All the blocks overlap at least partially with PetroVietnam’s, including potentially ones where foreign oil companies have ongoing exploration activities.

Foreign companies may be unlikely to cooperate with CNOOC to pursue investments in disputed blocks. Nevertheless, CNOOC’s action is significant for several reasons.  To start, the announcement of these blocks reflects another step in China’s effort to strengthen its jurisdiction over these waters. Just last week, for example, China raised the administrative status of the Paracel and Spratly Islands from county- to prefectural-level within Hainan Province.

The delineation of exploration blocks by a Chinese state-owned oil company not only enhances China’s claimed jurisdiction but also strengthens the legal basis of China’s ongoing opposition to Vietnam’s activities in these waters. In the past, China’s Foreign Affairs Ministry challenged the legality of Vietnam’s exploration and development activities by noting that they were in Chinese waters. Now, China can assert that such actions violate domestic laws related to resource development.

In addition, CNOOC’s announcement raises continued questions about coordination within China among maritime-related actors. When the blocks were announced, Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs Cheng Guoping was in Hanoi holding talks with ASEAN on implementing the 2002 declaration on a code of conduct. Needless to say, CNOOC’s announcement undercuts efforts since last summer to pursue a more moderate approach toward managing its claims in the South China Sea. In addition, it raises doubts about Beijing’s efforts to downplay maritime disputes and improve bilateral relations with Vietnam along with the status ofthe October 2011 agreement on basic principles for resolving for maritime issues.

Also, the location of the blocks implies that China (or at least CNOOC) may interpret the nine-dashed line on Chinese maps as reflecting China’s “historic rights” in the South China Sea. Such a claim would be inconsistent with the U.N. Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS), in which maritime rights can be claimed only from land features. China has pledged repeatedly in a variety of agreements and statements to abide by UNCLOS in the dispute.

The timing of the announcement is curious.  On the one hand, China may be reacting to what it sees as renewed challenges from its principal opponents in the South China Sea disputes. The Philippines has contested vigorously China’s claim over Scarborough Shoal since April, while Vietnam just passed a new maritime law that codifies its own claims to the Paracels and Spratlys as well as maritime rights. On the other hand, CNOOC’s announcement occurs just two weeks before the annual meeting of the ASEAN Regional Forum, increasing the region’s attention on disputes that China would prefer to handle bilaterally.

Unless foreign companies sign producing-sharing contracts with CNOOC and begin exploration activities in these blocs, CNNOC’s announcement remains more symbolic than substantive. Nevertheless, it’s likely to increase tensions and complicate efforts by all states to manage claims in the region.

[This originally appeared in The Diplomat]