TAIPEI: China deployed a record number of coast guard, scientific research and other ships in Taiwan\u2019s waters last month, the island\u2019s coast guard told AFP, as Beijing dials up pressure on Taipei.<\/p>\n
Taiwan\u2019s coast guard warned of an increasingly severe situation, as analysts say the increased activity is part of China\u2019s bid to map the region for submarine warfare.<\/p>\n
China\u2019s Communist Party has never ruled Taiwan, but Beijing claims the island democracy is part of its territory and has threatened to use force to annex it. China also asserts jurisdiction over Taiwan\u2019s surrounding waters.<\/p>\n
The number of Chinese ships detected around Taiwan\u2019s main island soared to a record 244 in July \u2014 an average of nearly eight every day, official data shared with AFP show.<\/p>\n
That compares with 55 ships detected in June and 30 in May, and 58 in July last year.<\/p>\n
In the first 21 days of this month, 152 vessels were detected.<\/p>\n
About 60 percent are coast guard ships, with research vessels and other government boats making up the rest.<\/p>\n
The figures do not include Chinese warships, which China\u2019s military deploys around Taiwan on a near-daily basis.<\/p>\n
China has long dispatched coast guard and research ships around the Asia-Pacific region, particularly in the hotly contested South China Sea, where Beijing and several littoral countries have competing claims.<\/p>\n
China uses the ships to assert authority over the waters, government officials and analysts say, describing them as \u201cgrey zone\u201d tactics \u2014 actions that fall short of an act of war.<\/p>\n
The number of Chinese ships detected around Taiwan and several of its outer islands since May is 1,247, coast guard figures show.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen we say the situation is becoming increasingly severe, we mean that the number of their government vessels in the waters surrounding Taiwan has increased, and there was a marked increase in July,\u201d a senior coast guard official told AFP on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to the media.<\/p>\n
The Communist Party \u201chas never ruled Taiwan for even a single day\u201d and \u201cwithout sovereignty over land, it has no right to claim economic zones at sea,\u201d the official said.<\/p>\n
– \u2018Submarine warfare\u2019 –<\/p>\n
While Taiwan faces the constant threat of a Chinese invasion, China\u2019s increasing maritime presence has also fueled concerns about a potential quarantine or blockade to prevent ships carrying energy or other critical supplies from entering or leaving its ports.<\/p>\n
China operates more than \u201c120 oceanographic research vessels,\u201d the Taiwanese coast guard said previously. It is tracking about 41 that operate in Taiwan\u2019s waters.<\/p>\n
They include the \u201cTong Ji,\u201d which circled Taiwan in May, tracking the edge of the island\u2019s restricted waters and refusing the coast guard\u2019s orders to leave.<\/p>\n
Its activities likely involved \u201coceanographic sampling and seabed survey operations,\u201d which could contribute to China\u2019s \u201canti-submarine warfare databases,\u201d the coast guard said.<\/p>\n
That was followed in June by China\u2019s first law enforcement patrol in waters east of Taiwan.<\/p>\n
Earlier this month, China also announced \u201ctraffic control measures\u201d for the Taiwan Strait as Typhoon Dolphin swept toward the region.<\/p>\n
A Taiwanese security official recently accused China of \u201cauthoritarian expansionism\u201d and warned Beijing was \u201cconstantly pushing the limits through an incremental salami-slicing approach.\u201d<\/p>\n
Ryan D. Martinson, an expert on China\u2019s maritime strategy at the US Naval War College, said Chinese research ships are owned and operated by civilian research institutes, but the data collected is shared with the military.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat kind of data\/knowledge is highly useful for Chinese naval forces, which will operate in these waters in the event of a conflict,\u201d Martinson said in an email to AFP, noting he was speaking in a personal capacity.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt is especially important for anti-submarine warfare and submarine warfare.\u201d<\/p>\n
– \u2018Clear escalation\u2019 –<\/p>\n
In the past couple of months, Martinson said he had observed a \u201cvery large increase\u201d in the number of Chinese research vessels operating around Taiwan, especially to the east of the island.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is not a new \u2018play\u2019 in its \u2018playbook\u2019. Rather, the novel aspect is that the scale of these operations around Taiwan is unprecedented,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Chinese research vessels have been seen \u201coperating in conjunction\u201d with coast guard ships around Taiwan, the coast guard official said.<\/p>\n
This month, China\u2019s \u201cXiang Yang Hong 03\u201d research vessel was observed operating within Taiwan and Japan\u2019s exclusive economic zones, moving over deep sea trenches and telecoms cables, said Jason Wang, chief operating officer of ingeniSPACE, which analyzes satellite imagery and ship signals data.<\/p>\n
The research vessel was escorted by a Chinese coast guard ship and a fishing boat that is part of China\u2019s maritime militia, Wang said.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is the first time we have seen maritime militia escort a research vessel in Taiwan\u2019s waters,\u201d Wang said.<\/p>\n
Wang said China\u2019s objective was to gather \u201cfresh hydrographic data of the Ryukyu Trench and East Taiwan Trench to conduct anti-submarine warfare\u201d and \u201cdeny US and other allied vessels from doing the same.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cAll of these developments are connected, I believe,\u201d said Martinson.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey represent a clear escalation in Beijing\u2019s efforts to exercise jurisdiction over the waters surrounding Taiwan, putting pressure on the country\u2019s leadership and undermining its sovereignty and sovereign rights.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
TAIPEI: China deployed a record number of coast guard, scientific research and other ships in Taiwan\u2019s waters last month, the island\u2019s coast guard told AFP, as Beijing dials up pressure on Taipei. Taiwan\u2019s coast guard warned of an increasingly severe situation, as analysts say the increased activity is part of China\u2019s bid to map the …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":102177,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-102153","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-world"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/102153","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=102153"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/102153\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":102178,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/102153\/revisions\/102178"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/102177"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=102153"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=102153"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=102153"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}