Is China eyeing new world order?

INCURSIONS Experts say China may be using Covid-19 situation to target rivals, enlarge its position on many borders

nNEW DELHI: Is China using the world’s preoccupation with the Covid-19 crisis to enlarge its position on several border disputes and target rivals that could have a say in shaping the post-pandemic global order? That’s a question now being debated by experts and analysts following a string of actions by China over the past few weeks and months. and observers pointed the finger at China. Peter Jennings, executive director of the Australian Strategic Policy Institute, told CNN there was a “95% chance that it is China who is responsible for this attack”.

Australia has been vocal in recent months about an international investigation into the origins of the Covid-19 pandemic and backed India’s calls for reforms of the World Health Organization for its initial handling of the crisis. China retaliated with tariffs on Australian exports, including barley and beef.

There has been no let-up in China’s activities to bolster its presence in the South China Sea, where it is embroiled in maritime boundary disputes with several countries, despite the Covid-19 pandemic. A Vietnamese vessel was rammed by a Chinese ship near Paracel Islands on June 10, months after another Vietnamese boat was sunk by China’s coast guard in the same area. Numerous Chinese vessels have been spotted near Thitu Island, controlled by the Philippines but claimed by China.

Earlier this month, Filipino authorities launched work on critical infrastructure on Thitu, located just 24 km from an artificial island created by China and equipped with radars and missiles. Over the past two months, an exploration vessel operated by Malaysia’sstate-runoilcompany Petronas has been harassed in the South China Sea by Chinese vessels.

Of these three countries, Vietnam has often turned to India to back its position in the South China Sea.

On Thursday, China set a new record of sorts by sending its vessels into waters off the Senkaku Islands for 66 consecutive days. The islands in the East China Sea are controlled by Tokyo but claimed by Beijing, and Chinese vessels have been spotted in Japan’s “contiguous zone” every day since April 14. The contiguous zone is the area beyond the territorial sea and extending up to 24 nautical miles from the baseline that a country can claim. Technically, the presence of the Chinese vessels is not an intrusion but Japan regards it as a provocation. Japan’s chief cabinet secretary Yoshihide Suga told the media on Wednesday the Senkaku islands are “unquestionably our territory historically and under international law” and that a protest had been lodged with China over the presence of the vessels. “We think it is extremely serious that these activities continue,” he said.

Both Japan and India are part of the Quadrilateral security dialogue or Quad, which was upgraded to the level of foreign ministers last September.

China has never been happy with the “one country, two systems” principle put in place for governing the special administrative region of Hong Kong when it was returned by the UK in 1997. After Hong Kong was roiled by protracted and widespread protests last year over the administration’s efforts to push a bill that would allow people to be extradited to mainland China for trial, Beijing moved amid the Covid-19 crisis to draft a national security law for the region that analysts say will undermine the semi-autonomous region’s systems. The draft law, submitted to a standing committee of the National People’s Congress this week, covers secession, subversion of state power, terror activities, and foreign interference.

India, in line with its policy of not speaking on the domestic and internal politics of China, has not publicly commented on the protests or the new draft law.

June 9, 2020

INDIA No visible activity

No activity

No activity

CHINA

Route appears blocked

Signs of activity

Route appears to be less accessible

June 16, 2020

INDIA Possible debris

Possible machinery

Machinery possibly disrupting water flow

No visible water

Possible machinery

Trucks

New crossing with water flowing under

CHINA

Flowing water Access trail

Possible machinery and trucks

Structures To Chinese camps

SINGAPORE/NEW DELHI: In the days leading up to the most violent border clash between India and China in decades, China brought in pieces of machinery, cut a trail into a Himalayan mountainside and may have even dammed a river, satellite pictures suggest. The images, shot on Tuesday, a day after soldiers engaged in hand-to-hand combat in the freezing Galwan Valley, show an increase in activity from a week earlier.

India said 20 soldiers were killed in a premeditated attack by Chinese troops on Monday night at a time when top commanders had agreed to defuse tensions on the Line of Actual Control (LAC), or the disputed and poorly defined border between the nucleararmed neighbours.

China rejected the allegations and blamed frontline Indian soldiers for provoking the conflict which took place at the freezing height of 14,000 feet (4,300 metres) in the western Himalayas.

The 4,056-km (2,520-mile) border between India and China runs through glaciers, snow deserts and rivers in the west to thickly forested mountains in the east.

The Galwan Valley is an arid, inhospitable area, where some soldiers are deployed on steep ridges. It is considered important because it leads to the Aksai Chin, a disputed plateau claimed by India but controlled by China.

THE MOST URGENT OF THE CRISES IS THE TENSE FACE-OFF BETWEEN INDIAN AND CHINESE BORDER TROOPS IN THE LADAKH SECTOR OF THE LINE OF ACTUAL CONTROL (LAC)