Regional News
China has warned India to halt joint energy projects with Vietnam in the South China Sea even as Beijing takes steps to reduce tensions with Hanoi and co-operate more closely in oil and gas exploration in the disputed waters.
In a joint statement issued on Saturday at the conclusion of a high-profile visit to China by Nguyen Phu Trong, the head of Vietnam’s ruling Communist party, Beijing and Hanoi said they would “actively boost co-operation” in offshore oil and gas exploration and exploitation as well as speed up negotiations to find a peaceful settlement to their long-running dispute.
But Beijing also publicly castigated Hanoi and New Delhi for an agreement in which India’s state-owned Oil & Natural Gas Corp will work with its counterpart PetroVietnam to develop oil and gas assets in parts of the South China Sea that Vietnam claims as its territory.
A front-page editorial published in an important official Chinese newspaper warned “India’s energy strategy is slipping into an extremely dangerous whirlpool,” and, Reuters reported, said India should “turn around at the soonest opportunity and leave the South China Sea.”
The editorial in China Energy News, published by official Communist Party mouthpiece the People’s Daily, also said “challenging the core interests of a large, rising country for unknown oil at the bottom of the sea will not only lead to a crushing defeat for the Indian oil company, but will most likely seriously harm India’s whole energy security and interrupt its economic development.”
On Friday, Liu Weimin, a spokesman for China’s foreign ministry, insisted that China had “indisputable sovereignty” over the waters in question and warned off India, saying New Delhi and Hanoi should “instead take positive steps to ensure peace and stability in the South China Sea.”
==============================================================================
By: Ben Bland in Hanoi and Jamil Anderlini in Beijing
Source: Financial Times, Oct. 16, 2011
To view the original article, click here.
Comment here