China sends troops to disputed islands in South China Sea

JANE PERLEZ

The Central Military Commission, China's most powerful military body, has approved the deployment of a garrison of soldiers from the People's Liberation Army to guard islands claimed by China in the South China Sea, the state-run Xinhua news agency said on Sunday.

The announcement came as Chinese authorities told state media that 45 legislators elected to govern the 1,100 people who live on the island groups of the Spratlys, the Paracels and the Macclesfield Bank — known in Chinese as the Xisha, Zhongsha and Nansha islands — met for the first time on Monday.

The new legislators would not only govern the island groups, many of them consisting of rocks and atolls, but also 2 million square km of the South China Sea over which China claims jurisdiction, according to state media.

The two moves appeared designed to reinforce China's claims over the South China Sea a week after a meeting of foreign ministers of the Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN) in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, at which China, according to diplomats at the meeting, used its influence to stop even a rudimentary communiqué on the South China Sea among the 10 nations.

The establishment of a legislature for the sparsely populated islands, and the dispatch of soldiers, will antagonize Vietnam, which claims the same islands. Vietnam and China have fought since the 1970s over the three island groups, and last month, Vietnam passed a law that claimed sovereignty over the Paracels and Spratly Islands. In response, China said the islands were the "indisputable" territory of China.

The Philippines and China have also been involved in a dispute for months over Scarborough Shoal, an area off the coast of the Philippines claimed by both countries.

In case of the Nansha, Xisha and Zhongsha islands, China's State Council approved the establishment of a prefectural-level administration known as Sansha City to replace a lower county level administration last month.

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