Vietnam demands halt to Chinese offshore drilling (fwd)

[AnHai Doan <anhai@cs.washington.edu>]

Hey folks, the game begins. Can Vietnam do anything other than loud
protesting?  Hai.


Subject: Vietnam demands halt to Chinese offshore drilling
  	  				 
	 HANOI, March 16 (Reuter) - Vietnam has called on Beijing to  
stop oil exploration in an area of the South China Sea which 
Hanoi considers its own, the official Vietnam News Agency (VNA) 
said on Sunday. 
	 VNA said Vietnam had lodged a formal complaint over Chinese  
drilling close to the disputed Spratly Islands and its 
coastguards had repeatedly warned vessels accompanying the oil 
rig that they were encroaching on foreign territorial waters. 
	 ``The operation of the Chinese oil rig has seriously violated  
Vietnam's sovereignty over its exclusive economic zone and 
continental shelf,'' VNA said, quoting a letter which was sent to 
the Chinese embassy in Hanoi on March 10. 
	 ``Vietnam demands the Chinese side stop the operation of the  
Kan Tan III oil rig and withdraw it from the exclusive zone and 
the continental shelf of Vietnam,'' the letter said. 
	 ``The note stresses that China's violation...runs counter to  
the fine development trend of the friendship and cooperation 
between the two countries and caused bad effects on the progress 
of the ongoing negotiation to solve border and territorial 
issues between the two countries,'' VNA added. 
	 It said the oil rig and tugboat were moved on March 7 into  
an area 64.5 nautical miles off Chan Nay Dong cape, halfway down 
the Vietnamese coast. 
	 Vietnam and China, which share a long history of mutual  
suspicion, have discussed land and maritime border disputes 
since they normalised relations in 1991. 
	 However, the two communist countries have made little  
progress over the South China Sea, where they are among several 
regional claimants to the potentially oil-rich Spratly and 
Paracel island chains. 
	 Chinese and Vietnamese warships clashed briefly in the  
Spratlys in the late 1980s and the dispute bubbled to the 
surface again last year when Hanoi granted an oil exploration 
and production contract near the archipelago to the U.S. firm 
Conoco. 
	 A month later, China announced that it was expanding the  
area of sea under its jurisdiction by more than 2.5 million sq 
km (965,000 sq miles), and said the move ensured it abided by a 
United Nations' convention on maritime law. 
	 VNA said that the Ministry of Foreign Affairs arranged hasty  
meetings with Chinese officials after the Kan Tan III oil rig 
started drilling and coastguards made repeated warnings. 
	 ``But Chinese ships ignored the warning and kept on drilling  
operations,'' it said.