OREANDA-NEWS. June 16, 2011. China has sent one of its biggest civilian maritime patrol ships into the South China Sea, official media said on Thursday, a move likely to raise tensions with neighbors staking rival claims to waters thought to hold vast reserves of oil and gas.

The Chinese Maritime Safety Administration's Haixun 31 left south China on Wednesday and will head for Singapore, passing the Paracel and Spratly island groups at the heart of disputes with Vietnam, the Philippines and other governments around the region.
Official media reports made the intent of the trip plain, and the news drew concern from the Philippines.
"Our country's biggest maritime patrol ship patrols the South China Sea," said the headline in the official Beijing Daily.

The Haixun 31 will monitor shipping lanes, carry out surveying, inspect oil wells exploring for undersea reserves and "protect maritime security," the paper said -- all steps that could make for confrontation with other countries pressing claims in the sea.

It is one of two civilian ships the same size which lack the heavy firepower of naval vessels. But the Haixun 31 weighs in with a displacement of 3,000 tonnes, has a helicopter pad and can stay at sea for 40 days at a stretch traveling at 18 knots, the Beijing Daily said.

China's move comes after weeks of trading accusations with Vietnam and the Philippines over what each government sees as intrusions and illegitimate claims over territorial waters by the other in a stretch of ocean spanned by key shipping lanes.

The Philippines would be concerned if China placed markers in disputed areas of the South China Sea, the Philippines Foreign Secretary Albert del Rosario said on Thursday after talks with his Australian counterpart in Canberra.

"We are very concerned about these markers being placed in waters and areas and features that are clearly ours," del Rosario told reporters.

The Philippines said on Wednesday that it had removed markers presumed to have been placed by China, the second such incident in two weeks.

A SHOW OF RESOLVE

The official Chinese media reports announcing the ship's journey did not mention those disputes specifically, but made plain the patrol was meant to show Beijing's resolve.

"Throughout its journey, it will carry out patrolling of the marine areas being developed by China in the South China Sea," said the Takung Pao, a Chinese-language Hong Kong newspaper that is under mainland control.

"It will protect national maritime rights and sovereignty."

The South China Sea tensions have been magnified by region-wide nervousness about China's naval modernization, which has included modernizing its civilian maritime administration ships.

China, the Philippines, Malaysia, Brunei and Taiwan all claim territory in the South China Sea.

China has accused Vietnam of violating its claim to the Spratly archipelago and nearby seas, which Vietnam also deems its own. China calls the islands the Nansha group.

China's claim is by far the largest, forming a vast U-shape over most of the sea's 648,000 square miles (1.7 million square km), including the Spratly and Paracel archipelagos.

Beijing said last week it would hold naval drills in late June in the western Pacific Ocean, and the Chinese navy has done little to disguise plans to launch its first aircraft carrier, the first step toward building an operating carrier group.

This week, Beijing also warned outside countries not to step into the dispute, after Vietnam said other countries, including the United States, could help defuse the tension.