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The Chinese Ministry of National Defense announced on June 24 that all vessels would be prohibited from entering areas located east of Zhoushan to Taizhou city in Zhejiang in the East China Sea from June 30 to July 5. During that time period, the People’s Liberation Army Navy (PLAN) conducted a six-day, live ammunition drill in a move that analysts say may be in response to a planned joint exercise between the United States and Republic of Korea (ROK) navies in the Yellow Sea. In spite of a lack of expert agreement over Chinese intentions, one aspect of the exercise...

Chinese media reports that beginning today the People’ Liberation Army (PLA) will hold six days of military exercises in the East China Sea, a message, analysts say, to the U.S. Navy not to steam its carrier battle groups too close to Chinese shores. While a Chinese military official said the drills are routine, observers say the anti-carrier exercise is intended to pressure the U.S. Navy not to hold joint exercises with the carrier USS George Washington and South Korean ships in the Yellow Sea. Respected China analyst Andrew Erickson says the live fire training aims to demonstrate China’s ability to...

Some military specialists suspect that China's failure to accept the findings of an international panel on the sinking of the South Korean coastal patrol ship in March is related to Beijing's probable foreknowledge of North Korean submarine movements. “I would suspect that either the PRC has on-site knowledge of DPRK submarines from a presence at their base or their own underwater monitoring systems in the Yellow Sea and East China Sea,” said one expert. “If their was the slightest indication of either foreknowledge or complicity it would hurt PRC standing in the international community.” China also has a close relationship...

A public announcement saying that the Chinese navy will kick-off a six-day exercise tomorrow in the East China Sea that will feature live ammunition has stirred speculation about the timing of the drill. A fleet under the PLA will take part in the drill from tomorrow to July 5 in waters off Zhengjiang's east coast in the East China Sea, according to a notice published Sunday on the local Wenzhou Evening News at the request of the fleet. The drill will be held from midnight to 6 pm every day. All irrelevant ships are prohibited from entering the region during...

East-Asia-Intel.com, June 9, 2010 The Obama administration is debating whether to dispatch the aircraft carrier strike group led by the USS George Washington to waters near Korea as a show of force. The strike group would ratchet up pressure on North Korea over its provocative sinking of the South Korean ship Cheonan in March that killed 46 sailors. The carrier strike group would be sent for a joint U.S.-South Korean anti-submarine drill. The drill was put on hold June 4. Officials in the Obama administration are opposing the exercises and the carrier strike group deployment over concerns that the show...

The People's Liberation Army's Navy (PLAN) submarines cannot spot United States satellites high overhead as the submarines leave their bases at Sanya on Hainan Island, Qingdao in Shandong province and Ningbo in Zhejiang province, and head for deeper water. Plenty of very deep water can be found in the South China Sea, especially in the zone north of the Spratly Islands, east of the Paracels, and south of the Luzon Strait. "A more challenging area for submarines to operate undetected is the East China Sea, which is quite shallow from the Chinese coastline up to the Okinawa Trough ... Detecting...

A private researcher last week identified a major Chinese submarine demagnetization facility near the East China Sea fleet submarine base. The new demagnetization facility is located less than 10 km from the Kilo submarine base at Maocao Nong approximately 40 km southeast of Ningbo in the Zhejiang province. Hans M. Kristensen, a project director at the Federation of American Scientists in Washington, said the facility is the second base used by China’s navy for submarine operations since 2008. The new facility is less than six miles from China’s base for Russian-made Kilo submarines at Moacao Nong, southeast of Ningbo, Zhejiang...

BEIJING A festering territorial dispute between China and Japan threatened to escalate on Friday after Beijing condemned Tokyo's decision to allow a Japanese company to explore for gas in the East China Sea. "This act by Japan is a grave provocation and violation of China's sovereign rights," a Chinese Foreign Ministry official in charge of Asian affairs, Cui Tiankai, told the Japanese ambassador to China, Chihiro Atsumi, who had been summoned to receive the official protest, the official Xinhua news agency reported. The Chinese Embassy in Tokyo also lodged a formal protest with the Japanese Foreign Ministry, Xinhua reported. China...

TOKYO (AP) - Japan on Wednesday said it had begun processing applications for gas exploration in a disputed section of the East China Sea, a move likely to aggravate a dispute with China that has threatened Tokyo's U.N. Security Council ambitions. Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi denied the move had anything to do with the dispute, the latest round of a long-running feud over Japan's World War II aggression. China had no immediate comment. Anti-Japanese protests erupted in Beijing and two other Chinese cities over the weekend, sparked by Japan's approval of a history textbook that critics say plays down Japanese...

The government said Friday gas deposits in Japanese waters were linked to the Chinese area of a contentious gas field in the East China Sea and threatened to grant drilling rights to domestic companies if Beijing did not stop projects in the area. China likely will begin drilling for the gas as early as summer, removing Japan's natural resources in the process. The government informed Beijing of the results of its investigation and issued a fervent demand that development in the area be halted. If Beijing does not accede to the request, the Economy, Trade and Industry Ministry, under whose...

China’s top offshore oil and gas producer, CNOOC Ltd., will begin operations this year at a gas field in the East China Sea despite a territorial dispute with Japan. ..CNOOC Chairman Fu Chengyu told reporters on Tuesday he expected the Chunxiao field, located south of Japan, to begin operations in August and September... ....On Monday Japanese media reported Japan had demanded that China halt construction at the Chunxiao natural gas field. Hydrocarbon deposits were found in the early 1970s... In 2004 China’s construction of the Chunxiao natural gas production plant 5 kilometres (3 miles) from the disputed area aggravated tensions...

Taipei, March 21 (CNA) Vice Minister of National Defense Huo Shou-yeh accentuated Monday the need for Taiwan to procure the U.S.-made Patriot PAC III anti-missile system, saying if the procurement plan is dropped, Taiwan will be unable to defend itself from China's missile attacks. Huo made the remarks while fielding questions from opposition lawmakers at a meeting of the Legislative Yuan's Defense Committee. In an attempt to persuade opposition lawmakers to support the Ministry of National Defense's (MND's) long-stalled arms procurement package, Huo said if the plan to purchase six Patriot PAC III anti-missile batteries is killed, Taiwan will not...

Beijing, Mar 4 (Prensa Latina) Chinese President Hu Jintao reasserted here Friday that his country will keep on making efforts to reach the peaceful reunification of China, but without permitting the independence of Taiwan. Hu Jintao, Head of State and Secretary General of the Chinese Communist Party (CPCh), talked about the topic before a group of delegates attending to the annual session of the Chinese People"s Political Consulting Conference (ChPPCC) in representation of Taiwan, which started Thursday. "We will keep on making our greatest efforts, with our greatest sincerity, searching for peaceful reunification, but we will never tolerate the independence...

China National Offshore Oil Corporation is considering a nearly $14bn (£7bn, €10.6bn) takeover of Unocal of the US. Sinopec, another Chinese state-controlled oil group, has struck a $70bn deal to buy Iranian crude oil and liquefied natural gas over three decades. China has sent $6bn to Rosneft, the Russian company that bought the main production unit of the embattled Yukos oil group, as advance payment for oil supplies. India has just reached a $40bn agreement to import LNG from Iran and develop Iranian oilfields, and is promoting pipeline projects to bring oil and gas across neighbouring countries to supply its...

China 'preparing for conflict with US' TAIPEI - China is secretly mapping underwater terrain in the Pacific in preparation for an eventual conflict with the United States there, reports said yesterday, quoting the Taiwanese Premier. Chinese surveillance ships sailed close to Japanese waters 14 times last year and seven times this year, and have also sailed 'numerous times' near the Pacific Ocean just east of Taiwan, the state-funded Central News Agency quoted Premier Yu Shyi-kun as saying during a transit stop in New York on his return from Latin America. The moves were a strong sign that China was preparing...

China demands Japan 'unconditionally' release activists The Chinese Foreign Ministry lodged a solemn representation Wednesday afternoon with Japan for illegally detaining seven Chinese citizens who landed on Diaoyu Island, a Chinese island in the East China Sea. Chinese Vice Foreign Minister Zhang Yesui Wednesday afternoon summoned Chikahito Harada, charge d'affaires of Japanese embassy in China, to lodge the representation. Zhang stated the stance of the Chinese government on the Diaoyu Island issue. He pointed out that Diaoyu Island and the attached islets have been a part of the Chinese territory since ancient times and China has indisputable sovereignty over these...

Vice minister of foreign affairs Wang Yi summoned Japanese ambassador to China, Koreshige Anami, and made a "formal representation" over Japan's reported leasing of three disputed isles in the East China Sea, state press said early Sunday. Xinhua news agency said Wang Saturday noted that the Diaoyu Islands -- also known as Senkaku in Japan and Diaoyu in China -- and adjacent islets had been a part of China since ancient times. "Any unilateral action on the islands by the Japanese side is illegal and invalid, which China will not accept," Wang said. "The Chinese government and people have the...