US Foreign Minister Mike Pompeo said on July 13 that the United States considers China’s land claims in the South China Sea to be “Illegal”, increasing the pressure on Beijing.
“The United States defends the idea of a free and open Indo-Pacific region. Today, we are strengthening the policy of the United States in a vital and disputed area of this region: the South China Sea ”, the US secretary of state said in a statement.
From 1er by July 5, Chinese military maneuvers around the Paracel Islands had increased tension, and Washington had responded by sending two aircraft carriers to the scene, the Ronald Reagan and the Nimitz. An unprecedented deployment of forces since 2014, especially since the United States Navy has carried out numerous maneuvers in the area.
“We say it clearly: Beijing’s claims to offshore resources in most of the South China Sea are completely illegal, as is its intimidation campaign to control them”, added Mike Pompeo. He recalled that a court of the Permanent Court of Arbitration in The Hague had ruled in 2016 that China had no legal basis to claim claims. “Historic rights” on this area.
An old rivalry
“The decision of the arbitral tribunal is final, and is binding on both parties”, he concluded. “The world will not allow China to treat the South China Sea as its maritime empire. “
The United States has long rejected China’s claims on almost all of the islets and reefs of the South China Sea facing neighboring countries (Malaysia, Vietnam, Philippines, Brunei). More than the Paracels, the object of the latest tensions, it is the archipelago of Spratleys, further south, which crystallizes most of the regional maritime tensions: the claims of the various neighbors overlap there.
While the United States has so far refrained from taking a position in the territorial disputes in this region, contenting itself with asserting the “Freedom of navigation”, the American secretary of state explicitly took sides for the states bordering on China. So the Mischief and Second Thomas Shoal reefs “Fall under the jurisdiction and sovereign rights of the Philippines”, in accordance with the 2016 judgment, he believes.
