(From Reuters)
China will invite private investment to build infrastructure on islands it controls in the disputed South China Sea and will this year start regular flights to one of them, state media said on Friday, moves likely to anger other claimants.
China claims almost all of the energy-rich waters of the South China Sea, through which more than $5 trillion of maritime trade passes each year. The Philippines, Brunei, Vietnam, Malaysia and Taiwan have overlapping claims.
In 2012, China set up what it calls Sansha city, based on Woody Island in the Paracels, to administer its islands there.
Though China calls it a city, its permanent population is no more than a few thousand, and many of the disputed islets and reefs in the sea are uninhabited.
Sansha’s deputy mayor, Feng Wenhai, said they will welcome private investment and “will initiate public-private-partnership program”, state news agency Xinhua said.
“The city will also push forward the planning and construction of a maritime medical rescue center. Submarine optical cables will be laid and put into use this year, and WiFi will cover all inhabited islands and reefs,” Feng said.
The airport on Woody Island will also this year launch regular flights, Feng added, without elaborating.
China took full control of the Paracels in 1974 after a naval showdown with Vietnam.
Hundreds of Vietnamese demonstrated in Hanoi when China established Sansha city and invited oil firms to bid for blocks in offshore areas that Vietnam claims as its territory. Read More