The G7 nations should stop inflaming territorial disputes in Asian waters and focus their energy on dealing with a slumping global economy, China said, in response to G7 calls for countries to stop land reclamation and militarization in one of the world’s busiest shipping lanes.
“China is strongly dissatisfied with relevant moves taken by G7,” Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesman Lu Kang (陸慷) said in a statement yesterday. “We urge G7 members to abide by their promise of not taking sides on territorial disputes, respect the efforts by regional countries, stop all irresponsible words and actions, and make constructive contribution to regional peace and stability.”
The G7 should have focused on righting a sluggish global economy “instead of hyping up maritime issues and fueling tensions in the region,” he said.
Lu’s remarks were in response to G7 foreign ministers raising concerns over tensions in the East China and South China seas, where China has been more aggressively asserting its territorial claims under Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平).
China “resolutely upholds its territorial sovereignty and maritime rights and interests” in the waterways, Lu said.
Sino-Japanese tensions have been on the rise over a chain of uninhabited islands in the East China Sea, which Taiwan also claim, while China’s bid to control more than 80 percent of the South China Sea overlaps with claims of five other countries, including Taiwan.
The G7 foreign ministers urged “all states to refrain from such actions as land reclamations, including large-scale ones, building outposts, as well as their use for military purposes and to act in accordance with international law, including the principles of freedoms of navigation and overflight,” in a statement released at the close on Monday of a two-day meeting in Hiroshima, Japan.
The statement did not directly mention China, which is a not a G7 member.
None of the five other states claiming territory in the South China Sea participated in the meeting.
An editorial by the Xinhua news agency accused Japan of trying to use the G7 to “contain China” and trying to divert China’s attention from the East China Sea by “interfering in disputes in the South China Sea.”
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