Hua Chunying News

China passed a law on Friday that for the first time explicitly allows its coast guard to fire on foreign vessels, a move that could make the contested waters around China more choppy.China has maritime sovereignty disputes with Japan in the East China Sea and with several Southeast Asian countries in the South China Sea.

The top U.S. diplomat for East Asia warned on Tuesday that Washington could respond with sanctions against Chinese officials and enterprises involved in coercion in the South China Sea after the United States announced a tougher stance to Beijing’s claims there.“Nothing is off the table ... there is room for that. This is a language the Chinese understand - demonstrative and tangible action,” David Stilwell, assistant secretary of state for East Asia, told a Washington think-tank when asked if sanctions were a possible U.S.

A Japanese destroyer and a Chinese fishing boat collided in the East China Sea on Monday night and no one was injured, Japan’s defense minister said, but China said a fisherman was hurt and suggested the Japanese vessel was to blame.The collision occurred about 650 km (400 miles) west of the Japanese island of Yakushima, Defence Minister Taro Kono said on Twitter on Tuesday.The crash opened a hole of more than a meter in length above the waterline of the destroyer, the Shimakaze, Kono said.“No personnel were injured and no one from the Chinese fishing boat was missing.

A Chinese oil survey vessel that has been embroiled in a tense standoff with Vietnamese vessels in the South China Sea left Vietnamese-controlled waters on Thursday after more than three months, marine data showed.The Chinese vessel, the Haiyang Dizhi 8, was speeding away from Vietnam's exclusive economic zone towards China on Thursday under the escort of at least two Chinese ships, according to data from Marine Traffic, a website that tracks vessels.China claims almost all the energy-rich waters of the South China Sea but neighbors Brunei, Malaysia, the Philippines, Taiwan and Vietnam also have claims.Tension between Hanoi and Beijing…

China accused the United States of bullying and warned it would hit back after the Trump administration raised the stakes in their trade dispute, threatening 10 percent tariffs on $200 billion of Chinese goods.China's commerce ministry said on Wednesday it was "shocked" and would complain to the World Trade Organisation, but did not immediately say how it would retaliate. In a statement, it called the U.S. actions "completely unacceptable".The foreign ministry described Washington's…

China on Friday denied reports it has been illicitly selling oil products to North Korea after U.S. President Donald Trump said he was not happy that China had allowed oil to reach the isolated nation. Trump said on Twitter the previous day that China had been "caught" allowing oil into North Korea and that would prevent "a friendly solution" to the crisis over North Korea's nuclear and missile programmes that it conducts in defiance of heavy U.N. Security Council sanctions. "I have been soft on China because the only thing more important to me than trade is war…

South Korea’s coast guard said it fired 249 warning shots over a group of Chinese fishing boats “swarming around” one of its patrol ships in South Korean waters, prompting a call for restraint from Beijing. South Korean coast guard vessels regularly chase Chinese boats suspected of fishing illegally in South Korean waters, at times sparking violent confrontations, complicating a relationship which is key to efforts to try to rein in North Korea’s nuclear and missile programs.

Missiles flew about 200 km into sea off east coast - S.Korea; launch is fourth by Pyongyang in four weeks. North Korea fired what appeared to be several land-to-ship missiles off its east coast on Thursday, South Korea's military said, a day after the South postponed full deployment of a controversial U.S. anti-missile system designed to deter a North Korean attack. The launches, the latest in a fast-paced series of missile tests defying world pressure to rein in its weapons programme, come less than a week after the United Nations Security Council passed fresh sanctions on the reclusive state. South Korea on Wednesday said it will hold off on installing remaining components of the U.S.

China appears to have largely completed major construction of military infrastructure on artificial islands it has built in the South China Sea and can now deploy combat planes and other military hardware there at any time, a U.S. think tank said on Monday. The Asia Maritime Transparency Initiative (AMTI), part of Washington's Center for Strategic and International Studies, said the work on Fiery Cross, Subi and Mischief Reefs in the Spratly Islands included naval, air, radar and defensive facilities. The think tank cited satellite images taken this month, which its director, Greg Poling, said showed new radar antennae on Fiery Cross and Subi. "So look for deployments in the near future," he said. China has denied U.S. China's Defense Ministry did not respond to a request for comment.

China said on Thursday that it hoped the entry into service of Japan's second big helicopter carrier, the Kaga, did not mean a return to the country's past militaristic history. The ship, along with its sister the Izumo, gives Japan's military greater ability to deploy beyond its shores as it pushes back against China's growing influence in Asia. Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying said that in recent years Japan had exaggerated the "China threat" as an excuse to expand its military. "I also want to say that the Kaga was sunk by the U.S. military in World War Two. Japan should learn the lessons of history," Hua told a daily news briefing.

China on Thursday pledged a firm response if Japan stirs up trouble in the South China Sea, after Reuters reported on a Japanese plan to send its largest warship to the disputed waters. The Izumo helicopter carrier, commissioned only two years ago, will make stops in Singapore, Indonesia, the Philippines and Sri Lanka before joining the Malabar joint naval exercise with Indian and U.S. naval vessels in the Indian Ocean in July, sources told Reuters. The trip would be Japan's biggest show of naval force in the region since World War Two. "If Japan persists in taking wrong actions, and even considers military interventions that threaten China's sovereignty and security...

China said on Tuesday it was waiting for an official word on why Japan plans to send its largest warship on a three-month tour through the South China Sea, but that it hopes Japan can be responsible. China claims almost all the disputed waters and its growing military presence has fuelled concern in Japan and the West, with the United States holding regular air and naval patrols to ensure freedom of navigation. The Izumo helicopter carrier, commissioned only two years ago, will make stops in Singapore, Indonesia, the Philippines and Sri Lanka before joining the Malabar joint naval exercise with Indian and U.S. naval vessels in the Indian Ocean in July, sources told Reuters.

China said on Tuesday it had "irrefutable" sovereignty over disputed islands in the South China Sea after the White House vowed to defend "international territories" in the strategic waterway. White House spokesman Sean Spicer in his comments on Monday signaled a sharp departure from years of cautious U.S. handling of China's assertive pursuit of territorial claims in Asia. "The U.S. is going to make sure that we protect our interests there," Spicer said when asked if Trump agreed with comments by his secretary of state nominee, Rex Tillerson. On Jan. 11, Tillerson said China should not be allowed access to islands it has built in the contested South China Sea.

China on Wednesday said it was "very dissatisfied" with South Korea after the latter's coast guard fired warning shots at Chinese fishermen in South Korean waters. South Korea's coast guard vessels regularly chase Chinese boats for fishing illegally off the country's coast, at times sparking violent confrontations. On Tuesday, the South Korean Coast Guard said it stopped two Chinese vessels that were fishing illegally, prompting about 30 other Chinese boats in the same group to swarm around and collide with the coast guard vessel. "The safety of our own Coast Guard members was at risk," said Lee Dae-haeng, a spokesman at the Coast Guard's central regional headquarters. No Chinese fishermen were harmed, however, said South Korea's Yonhap news agency.

China said on Monday the situation at the disputed Scarborough Shoal in the South China Sea "has not changed and will not change", after the Philippines said Chinese vessels that blocked the area for four years had stopped harassing its fishermen. Philippine security officials on Sunday said China had scaled down its maritime presence at the shoal since President Rodrigo Duterte's return from a visit to Beijing aimed at patching-up ties and courting investment. The disputed territory is significant not only for fishing, but for the broader balance of power in the South China Sea, and the circumstances behind China's apparent softening of its position are not clear.

Increasingly assertive action by China's coast guard ships in the South China Sea risks destabilising the region, according to the authors of new research tracking maritime law enforcement incidents across the vital trade route. While the risks of full-blown naval conflict dominates strategic fears over the disputed waterway, the danger of incidents involving coast guards should not be underestimated, said Bonnie Glaser, a regional security expert at Washington's Center for Strategic and International Studies think tank.

Talks to explore pathways to peace and cooperation. The Philippines wants formal negotiations with China to explore pathways to peace and cooperation, the Southeast Asian nation's special envoy, Fidel Ramos, said on Friday, after a meeting with former Chinese deputy foreign minister Fu Ying. Ramos was speaking near the end of a trip to Hong Kong undertaken in a bid to rekindle ties with China, which have been soured by a maritime dispute in the South China Sea. An arbitration court in the Hague ruled on July 12 that China had no historic title over the busy waterway and had breached the Philippines' sovereign rights there. The decision infuriated Beijing, which dismissed the court's authority.

Japan said on Monday it would respond firmly after Chinese government vessels intruded into what Japan considers its territorial waters near disputed islands in the East China Sea 14 times at the weekend. Ties between China and Japan, the world's second and third largest economies, have for years been plagued by a dispute over the islands that Japan controls, and the waters around them. The flurry of Chinese incursions into the waters follows a period of sustained pressure on China about its activities in the South China Sea, and a Chinese criticism of what it saw as Japanese interference in that dispute. Chinese activity near the disputed East China Sea islands…

China's Foreign Ministry on Thursday brushed off doubts about how many countries have offered support for its position in a case brought by the Philippines over Chinese claims in the South China Sea, saying the number of nations was growing daily. China has stepped up its rhetoric ahead of an expected ruling by the Permanent Court of Arbitration in the Hague on the Philippine case. China refuses to recognise the case and says all disputes should be resolved through bilateral talks. China says more than 40 countries have offered support for its position, the most recent being Zimbabwe and Sri Lanka. But only eight countries have come out in public support, including land-locked nations such as Niger and Afghanistan, says Washington's Center for Strategic and International Studies.

An Indonesian naval vessel fired on a Chinese fishing boat on Friday, injuring one person, China's foreign ministry said, the countries' third reported confrontation this year near a chain of islands as regional tensions mount in the South China Sea. Beijing had made official protests over the incident, the ministry said in its statement on Sunday, and urged Indonesia not to take any more actions to complicate the situation. Indonesia's navy said it had fired warning shots at several boats with Chinese flags that it said were fishing illegally near the Natuna Islands, but did not mention any injuries. Indonesia is not part of a broader regional dispute over China's reclamation activities in the South China Sea and Beijing's claims on swathes of key waterways.

China and South Korea held talks on delimiting their overlapping exclusive economic zones (EEZs) in the Yellow Sea – the first such discussions in seven years. Chinese Vice Foreign Minister Liu Zhenmin talked to his South Korean counterpart, Cho Tae-yul on maritime demarcation. Chinese foreign ministry says a reasonable and fair solution between the two countries is significant to the regional peace and stability. President Xi Jinping and his ROK counterpart Park Geun-hye agreed to start the talks in July 2014 during Xi's visit to the ROK. Beijing believes that the ownership of Suyan Rock, a submerged feature in the East China Sea in the exclusive economic zones claimed by both China and the ROK, should be determined through negotiation.

China will encourage ships flying its flag to take the Northwest Passage via the Arctic Ocean, a route opened up by global warming, to cut travel times between the Atlantic and Pacific oceans, a state-run newspaper said on Wednesday. China is increasingly active in the polar region, becoming one of the biggest mining investors in Greenland and agreeing to a free trade deal with Iceland. Shorter shipping routes across the Arctic Ocean would save Chinese companies time and money. For example, the journey from Shanghai to Hamburg via the Arctic route is 2,800 nautical miles shorter than going by the Suez Canal. China's Maritime Safety Administration this month released a guide offering detailed route guidance from the northern coast of North America to the northern Pacific…

China expressed anger on Wednesday after a senior British official said a ruling expected within a few months in an international arbitration case the Philippines has brought against China's South China Sea claims must be binding. Hugo Swire, British minister of state responsible for East Asia, also said Britain saw the ruling, by the Permanent Court of Arbitration in the Hague, as an opportunity for China and the Philippines to renew dialogue over their territorial disputes. China claims virtually all of the South China Sea and rejects the court's authority in the case, which is widely expected to go in favour of the Philippines, significantly raising tension in the strategic waterway.