Harris accuses Beijing of dirty tactics in South China Sea row
THE US vice-president yesterday accused Beijing of “coercion and intimidation” in the hotly contested waters of the South China Sea.
Kamala Harris said China’s actions “threaten the sovereignty of nations” in a speech given in Singapore as part of a short tour of South East Asia.
Although she assured Asian leaders they would not be forced to choose between the world’s two largest economies, she also stressed that “the United States stands with our allies and partners in the face of these threats”.
She also spoke about President Joe Biden’s vision for the region, built on rules, human rights and freedom of navigation and trade.
Beijing hit back saying that the chaotic withdrawal of American troops from Afghanistan “clearly reveals the US definition of rules and order”.
Wang Wenbin, a Chinese foreign ministry spokesman, accused Washington of arbitrarily launching “military intervention in a country without shouldering the responsibility for the suffering of the people”.
He added: “It gets to decide when it wants to come and leave without consulting the international community, not even its allies. It can wantonly smear, suppress, coerce and bully other countries for the sake of ‘America First’ without paying any price. This is the kind of order that the US wants.”
China asserts its right to almost all the waters of the South China Sea, whose fishing grounds, reefs and islands are claimed by several other nations, including the Philippines, Vietnam and Taiwan.
China’s sweeping claims of sovereignty have raised alarm that it could gain control over shipping lanes, giving it coercive economic leverage over rival nations, not least Taiwan to which China still lays claim.
Meanwhile, Ms Harris’s flight from Singapore to Vietnam was delayed by almost three hours after the US embassy in Hanoi reported two potential cases of “Havana syndrome”. It is still unknown what causes the condition, coined in Cuba in 2015, which has left US diplomats suffering mysterious nosebleeds, migraines, and nausea after experiencing piercing sounds at night.