Satellite images show that the Chinese coastguard ship damaged by the collision with a Chinese navy vessel earlier this month in the South China Sea is currently being repaired at Hainan Island - the first confirmation it has returned to port.

Maxar Technologies provided images showing the vessel with its bow crushed flanked by tugs at Yulin Naval Base near Sanya on Hainan. Chinese officials never commented on the incident, which was reported by the Philippines to have occurred on August 11, when the coast guard vessels of the Philippines were delivering supplies to Filipino fisherman near the Scarborough Shoal.

The collision was the first between Chinese vessels known to have occurred in the area, amid long-standing tensions over features that straddle the important trade route. Beijing accused Manila of "dangerous maneuvers" but did not mention the collision. Manila's Foreign Ministry said that it was not responsible for the accident.

Jiang Bin, a spokesperson for the Chinese Ministry of Defence, said that time: "We demand the Philippine side to immediately cease its provocative and infringing rhetoric and actions." China's coast guard ships patrol Scarborough (also known as Huangyan Dao) regularly, in order to maintain its historic claim over a large part of the South China Sea. The Scarborough Shoal is not a sovereign territory.

The Permanent Court of Arbitration at The Hague was not charged with establishing sovereign authority in a landmark 2016 ruling that invalidated Beijing's broad claims to the South China Sea.

It ruled that China's blockade on the shoal was in violation of international law, and stated that the area is a traditional fishing grounds for many countries. China rejected the ruling.

Maxar and others analysts were confident that the vessel shown in the photos was CG3104, the vessel involved in the accident.

The Chinese Defence Ministry did not respond immediately to any questions regarding the fate of this ship or if there were casualties. They also refused to confirm if it reached Hainan on its own. The Philippines Coast Guard spokesperson Jay Tarriela stated on Wednesday that the Coast Guard had watched the two Chinese ships leave the shoal a day after the incident, but they did not see the Chinese vessels during a later flight that week.

Tarriela released footage taken by a Philippine coast guard vessel of the accident.

Tarriela stated that the Chinese Coast Guard did not inform the Philippines Coast Guard of any possible casualties or injuries. Ship trackers online noted that CG3104's transponder was not on either before or after the incident. However, another coastguard ship and other Chinese ships conducted search and rescue near the shoal the next day.

Collin Koh, a Singaporean security expert, said that the vessel was deployed by the Navy as a Type 056 Corvette. It is therefore natural for the vessel to return to a Naval base for repairs rather than a Coast Guard base.

Koh of Singapore's S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies said that the Yulin facilities, which house Chinese aircraft carriers and ballistic missile subs, are the largest on the southern Chinese coastline. (Reporting by Greg Torode and Karen Lema from Hong Kong; Additional reporting by Beijing Newsroom; Editing done by Raju Gopalakrishnan).

(source: Reuters)