HANOI/BEIJING: China’s top diplomat scolded Vietnamese officials during talks in Hanoi yesterday for “hyping up” a row over a Chinese oil rig drilling in disputed waters in the South China Sea, in tough comments that suggest relations will remain rocky.
State Councillor Yang Jiechi also told his hosts that the rig’s activities in waters also claimed by Vietnam were “completely legal,” China’s Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying said at a daily briefing in Beijing.
Yang, who outranks the country’s foreign minister, made the remarks in a meeting with Vietnamese Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Pham Binh Minh.
Before the visit, experts had said many obstacles remained to resolving one of the worst breakdowns in Sino-Vietnamese relations since the neighbours fought a brief war in 1979.
Among them is Beijing’s demand for compensation in the wake of anti-Chinese riots that erupted in Vietnam after the drilling platform was deployed on May 2.
“The most urgent thing is for Vietnam to stop its interference and harassment, stop hyping up the issue and stop whipping up disagreement to create new disputes, and properly deal with the aftermath of the recent serious incidents of violence,” Hua said, describing Yang’s comments.
Yang later met Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung and was due to have talks with the head of Vietnam’s ruling communist party before attending a dinner hosted by Minh.
Yang’s visit is the highest-level direct contact between the two sides since the rig was parked 240 kilometres off the coast of Vietnam.
Vietnam says the platform is in its 200-nautical mile exclusive economic zone and on its continental shelf. China has said the rig is operating completely within its waters near the Paracel Islands, which are occupied by China.
“Yang Jiechi said China and Vietnam’s relations are facing difficulties at the moment because for more than a month, Vietnam has been continually illegally harassing Chinese drilling operations in the waters near the Paracel Islands,” Hua said.
“Yang stressed that the Paracel Islands are China’s inherent territory and that there exists no dispute about this.”
Nevertheless, both sides believed the talks were “frank and constructive,” Hua added.
Earlier, Yang and Minh shook hands in front of reporters without smiling at a government guesthouse. Outside the building, neither country’s national flag was flying, as is customary when senior foreign visitors attend meetings in Hanoi.
Reuters
