A Chinese maritime police ship sails around a disputed island in the East China Sea.
China implemented the Marine Police Law on February 1, which authorizes the Chinese Marine Police to use force against illegal acts of foreign vessels in the Chinese jurisdiction. The Philippine Foreign Minister expressed his protest, and Japan, the United States, Vietnam, India and other countries expressed their concern. Scholars believe that the Chinese Communist Party‘s paramilitary authorization of “China’s second navy” has raised regional tensions, and has more significance for internal than external propaganda, as part of a pressure test on the new Biden regime, which has put pressure on neighboring countries.
The Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress of mainland China passed the “Marine Police Law” on January 22, which provides that if a foreign ship enters the waters under China’s jurisdiction “to illegally engage in production and operational activities, disobeys instructions to stop the ship or refuses to allow the Chinese marine police to board and inspect the ship”, the Chinese marine police will be allowed to use force after warnings are ineffective.
The provisions of the Marine Police Law state that the scope of law enforcement by the Chinese Marine Police includes China’s internal waters, territorial waters, contiguous zone, economic waters, continental reefs and “other waters under Chinese jurisdiction”. If foreign organizations and individuals build buildings, structures, fixed or floating devices, etc. in waters under China’s jurisdiction and on islands and reefs without approval, the Marine Police may request that they be removed within a certain period of Time, and if they fail to do so, they have the right to forcibly remove them.
The Philippines’ foreign minister, Teodoro Locsin Jr., who originally thought he would stay out of it, said on the 27th that the law “is a verbal threat of war against any country that disobeys it” and lodged a diplomatic protest against China.
The Chinese Communist Party’s move has also raised concerns in Indonesia, Vietnam and other countries around the South China Sea. The U.S. and Japanese heads of national security, defense, and diplomacy have been hot-wiring the Diaoyutai issue frequently in recent days, and Biden met with Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga by phone on Jan. 28. Both men agreed to strengthen the U.S.-Japan alliance and reaffirmed that the U.S.-Japan Security Treaty applies to the Diaoyutai Islands.
Diaoyutai.
Diaoyutai “double domination” conflict first
The Japanese Sankei Shimbun Taipei branch director Akio Yaban pointed out in an interview with Radio Free Asia on the 28th that Chinese maritime police ships patrol the Diaoyutai Islands on a regular basis, and last year went 333 days out of 365 days a year, and 32 days out of 32 days was basically a typhoon.
Yaban Akio said: “China navigation patrol into ‘double domination’, China is equal to semi-control Diaoyutai, the frequency of cruising than Japan, Diaoyutai who domination changed to say unclear, if the scene commander has the right to enforce the law can shoot, and Japan does not have the right to shoot, the domination is firmly in the hands of China.”
Yaban Akio pointed out that if patrol boats from countries that also claim sovereignty over the islands in the South China Sea are present in the waters, the one that can shoot to enforce the law has a huge advantage, and the other side will be under a lot of pressure.
Yaban Akio mentioned that Beijing‘s revision of the maritime police law after the Japanese Prime Minister Abe stepped down, passed after Biden took office, just like the military aircraft around Taiwan, “I do some action you do not react, it is made, if there is a reaction that each other and then discuss, this is through the change of regime in the United States, the Chinese Communist Party’s foreign expansion of specific actions.”
Chen Yongfeng, director of the Center for Japanese Studies at Tunghai University, was interviewed by Radio Free Asia and analyzed that the China-EU investment agreement, the Hong Kong arrests, the military aircraft disturbing Taiwan, and the passage of the maritime police law can all be seen as a part of Beijing’s pressure test on Biden. He believes that the passage of the Maritime Police Law by the Chinese Communist Party is a way to put Diaoyutai under domestic police jurisdiction and legalize territorial conflicts.
Scholar: Shooting is against China’s interests
The Chinese government has been trying to stimulate its neighbors and the world, and this is part of its war-wolf diplomacy, but it is not diplomacy when it comes to internal affairs. Recently, China and India are fighting again. It is also a territorial issue, there have been conflicts, and will not rise, both sides have nuclear weapons, both have flying bombs, and surprisingly fought with bare hands, which is strange, right!”
Chen Yongfeng said, “There is a faction in Japan on the Diaoyutai issue as a litmus test for the armed conflict between China and Japan, it is best for China to shoot at Diaoyutai, it can test the U.S.-Japan alliance treaty is true or false? China knows that firing is against Chinese national interests. I don’t think China has the power to challenge the U.S. today, but there is a faction in Japan that would like to observe if the U.S. would contribute if guns were wiped out?”
Chinese maritime police vessels on a security drill outside Shanghai harbor in June 2009.
Again, Chen Yongfeng said, it depends on how China practices its Maritime Police Act in the South China Sea? There is no way to expel Indonesian, Vietnamese, and Philippine ships, and that is very costly, especially since the U.S. military has been advocating that the South China Sea is a free navigation area, an important navigation path in the Southeast China Sea, and a route for the Middle East to transport oil to East Asia, and should be passed without harm.
Blurring domestic law enforcement and military operations
Professor Song Xuewen of the Institute of Strategic and International Affairs at CKS University, in an interview with Radio Free Asia, believes that the Marine Police Act is a flexible military strategy for China, using the concept of maintaining social security to deal with military operations, raising the level of conflict between the two sides of the Taiwan Strait, and neighboring countries through paramilitary behavior. Confusing purely civilian or semi-military paramilitary behavior, China’s future to other countries ships, official or scientific research vessels, can be arbitrarily inspected to threaten to deter, in the Taiwan Sea, East China Sea, South China Sea, the implementation of his so-called jurisdiction, fear will cause a high degree of regional unrest.
Song Xuewen said: “Give him to fire the first shot justified, and a buffer zone, not with the Navy to fire the first shot, is the implementation of civilian operations to fire the first shot, the regional peace and stability, and the United States stressed the freedom of navigation at sea is a major challenge.”
Song Xuewen said that the Chinese government considers itself “jurisdiction” is large and determined by him, “the Chinese Communist Party even believes that there is no median line in the Taiwan Strait, if there is no median line in the Taiwan Strait, the entire Taiwan Strait is his jurisdiction, the South China Sea to follow his nine-dash line, he set up offices in Xisha, Nansha, Yongxing Island, Yongxia Reef are in his scope. Giving the Marine Police Act to enforce China’s so-called official rights behind the expansion of his military power.”
Song Xuewen said that China’s marine police with military assembly and preparation, hanging sheep’s head selling dog meat, equal to the “second navy”, if he fired with the marine police, the other side is very difficult to return fire on warships.
Blue Committee: Marine police law enforcement scope is unclear
The government of the Republic of China claims Diaoyutai and the South China Sea islands as its inherent territory, but no protest action has been seen. The spokesman of the Mainland Affairs Council in charge of cross-strait affairs, Qiu Chuizheng, responded on the 28th that this move by the Chinese Communist Party has caused protests and discontent in Japan, the Philippines and other regional countries, and international public opinion is that this matter has highlighted the Chinese Communist Party’s attempts to expand abroad and raise tensions in the periphery. As a member of the Asia-Pacific region, mainland China should abide by international law and fulfill its commitment to maintain regional peace by exercising self-restraint, and the government will pay close attention to the safety of law enforcement.
Chen Yuzhen, a member of the Nationalist Party’s Kinmen legislature, said in an interview with Radio Free Asia that there was a tacit agreement between the two sides of the Taiwan Strait in the past that there was an “invisible median line” between Kinmen and Xiamen, not to exceed or capture. But there have been many cases of mainland fishermen crossing the border fishing, sand pumping, and even once rammed Taiwan’s sea patrol official ship.
Chen Yuzhen said, the problem is that the Chinese maritime police jurisdictional waters do not know the definition to that? Is the Chinese territorial waters are counted? Will it include the entire island of Taiwan? If so, the problem is more complicated.
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