China to step up maritime patrols in Spratlys

MANILA, Philippines - China will increase maritime surveillance in a group of disputed islands in the East China Sea to guard its territorial rights, the official Xinhua news agency said late Monday.

The uninhabited but strategically located island chain known as Diaoyu in Chinese is believed to be rich in oil and gas reserves, and is at the heart of a long-running diplomatic dispute among China, Japan and Taiwan.

“The patrols are part of our important long-term responsibility,” Wu Ping, deputy head of government agency China Maritime Surveillance said.

Two Chinese patrol boats recently conducted a mission to monitor “illegal” oil and gas extraction projects around the disputed island chain, the report said. The islands are known as Senkaku in Japan.

Disputes over the East China Sea and South China Sea have intensified in recent years with several Asian nations locked in competing claims over parts of the isles.

Beijing says it has sovereignty over essentially all of the South China Sea, where its professed ownership of the Spratly archipelago overlap with

claims by Vietnam, the Philippines, Taiwan, Brunei and Malaysia.

Meanwhile, the municipal government of Kalayaan, in coordination with the Philippine Ports Authority (PPA), will construct within the year a beaching ramp in Pag-asa Island, one of the biggest islands occupied by Filipino troops in the Spratlys group of islands.

Kalayaan Mayor Eugenio Bito-onon, who is in Manila for a series of coordinating conferences with concerned government agencies for the development of the island town, said the construction of the beaching ramp has been long delayed.

“This time, the PPA with the support of the Philippine Navy (PN) is expected to finish the beaching ramp project within this year,” Bito-onon said.

He said the island municipality needs the beaching ramp for easier delivery of supplies for local residents.

Once the beaching ramp becomes operational, Bito-onon said this would further enhance the development of the area as roll-off/roll-on (RORO) vessels could already deliver and unload their cargo to the island municipality.

In the absence of a beaching ramp in Pag-asa, cargo delivered by boat from mainland Palawan are hauled ashore by smaller boats.

He said construction of the beaching ramp and the repair of the 1.3-kilometer airstrip is part of ongoing efforts to develop existing facilities in the island.

Classified as a 6th class municipality of Palawan, Kalayaan has a regulated population of 67 families, mostly fishermen, aside from the soldiers who are deployed in the area.

At present, the island has a water-filtering plant, power generators, weather station and a private telecommunication tower of Smart Telecommunications.

Aside from the Filipino military contingent, other claimant countries except Brunei has deployed forward troops in their occupied islets and atolls in the archipelago to bolster their respective territorial claims in the region. – Jaime Laude