China has passed a controversial law giving the coast guard more freedom to fire at foreign ships, an action that could increase the risk of military miscalculation in the Western Pacific.
The law aims to “safeguard national sovereignty, security and maritime rights,” the official Xinhua News Agency said in a report early Saturday. The law will enter into force on February 1.
China’s coast guard would be allowed to use “any means necessary”, including the use of weapons, to stop or prevent threats from foreign ships, the text released by Xinhua said. Coast Guard personnel will be allowed to board foreign ships operating in China’s “jurisdictions,” a term that refers to areas claimed by other countries.
The move could increase the risk of miscalculation in the vast areas of disputed waters stretching from China’s coast. Chinese coastguard ships often come into close contact – sometimes with tense stalemates – with foreign ships, claiming Beijing’s claims to much of the South and East China’s seas.
Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying told a regular briefing in Beijing on Friday that the move was “normal legislative activity of the NPC” and that China will “remain committed to peace and stability in the sea” .
Claims to the resource-rich waters of the South China Sea have put China at odds with Southeast Asia’s neighbors, including Malaysia, the Philippines and Vietnam. In the East China Sea, Chinese and Japanese government ships routinely follow each other on patrols near uninhabited islands claimed by both sides.
Earlier this week, in a conference call with Chinese counterparts, Japanese diplomats strongly opposed the repeated raids by the country’s ships near the disputed Senkaku Islands, known in China as the Diaoyus. The Chinese delegates urged the two sides to work towards making the area a “sea of peace, cooperation and friendship,” the foreign ministry said in Beijing.
The law is China’s latest step to strengthen its Coast Guard, which was established in 2013 by amalgamating several maritime agencies and included in the People’s Armed Police in 2018. The fleet has recently become more present in disputed waters, including a standoff with Vietnam. at the Vanguard Bank in the South China Sea in 2019.
The move could also prompt other countries to strengthen their military presence in the waters, including then-US security adviser Robert O’Brien said last year that the US Coast Guard wanted to expand its presence in the Pacific.
– With help from John Liu, Jing Li and Colum Murphy