BEIJING is using an "insidious" policy of coercion and pressure to assert its control over the South China Sea, a leading Asia analyst has said. China has long claimed sovereignty over the disputed waters, saying that the entire waterway up to the coasts of the Philippines, Malaysia and Taiwan belongs to it. Beijing's claim is based on the U-shaped nine-dash line etched onto a map in the 1940s by a Chinese geographer. In 2016, an international court of arbitration dismissed China's territorial claims. Despite the ruling, the People's Republic has in recent years built artificial islands in the waters claimed...