Vietnam has protested one of the blocks included in China National Offshore Oil Corp.'s latest batch of offshore exploration offerings, saying it is a violation of its sovereign territory by its larger neighbor.
Block 65/12 lies 3 miles off Cay Island in the Paracel Islands, which are claimed by Vietnam but are currently under China's control, according to a statement issued by Vietnam's Foreign ministry spokesman Luong Thanh Nghi late Friday. China calls the Paracel Islands the Xisha Islands.
Nghi issued the statement while answering reporters' questions over the 26 exploration blocks that CNOOC offered on August 27.
"China's launch of the international tender for the block [65/12] has seriously violated Vietnam's sovereignty over the Paracel Islands," Nghi said. He said the move was illegal and had no validity, and Vietnam demanded that China cancel it.
Tension between China and Vietnam increased after CNOOC offered nine blocks for exploration at the end of June that included areas just off the east coast of Vietnam that had already been awarded to ExxonMobil, Gazprom and ONGC Videsh.
That offer came just after Vietnam's National Assembly approved a maritime law on June 21 claiming sovereignty and jurisdiction over both the Paracel and Spratly island groups.
China has had control over the Paracel Islands since 1974 after a brief conflict with Vietnam. In July this year, it formally established Sansha City in the Paracels as a prefecture of Hainan province to serve as an administrative center for both the Paracels and Spratlys.
China claims sovereignty over as much as 80% of the South China Sea as outlined by its so-called nine-dashed line, which ropes in the Paracel and Spratly islands as well as island atolls closer to the Philippines.
Estimates for the potential hydrocarbon resources in the South China Sea run as high as 200 billion barrels of oil equivalent -- with some Chinese estimates running higher -- although due to the lack of exploratory drilling there are no proven oil or gas reserve estimates.
China's claim to the South China Sea has been most resolutely contested by Vietnam and the Philippines, although Brunei, Malaysia and Taiwan all stake claims to some island territories in the region.
The Philippines is also an active claimant in terms of oil and gas exploration rights, and has an ongoing dispute with China over it latest exploration round, which takes in two areas that China says fall within its waters. The two areas claimed by China -- Areas 3 and 4 out of 15 blocks on offer -- are located offshore northwest Palawan Island, lying within about 80 kilometers (49 miles) of the Philippine coast at their closest point.
Apart from Area 3 and 4, China also claims sovereignty over exploration area Service Contract 72, just to the southwest of the two blocks.
CLINTON IN ASIA
The renewed tension between China and Vietnam over exploration rights and sovereignty in the South China Sea come at the start of US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's trip to Asia that will take in the Cook Islands, Indonesia, China, Timor-Leste, Brunei and Russia.
Clinton was headed to Indonesia Monday where she was expected to meet with Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono and visit the headquarters of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations to urge a unified ASEAN diplomatic response to China over South China Sea issues.
Clinton hopes "to get a sense of where we are and to get the Indonesians' advice about how we can be supportive, how we can put more wind into the sails of a diplomatic effort, which is what we all very much want," a senior US official on her plane said on customary condition of anonymity, according to AFP.
"The most important thing is that we end up in a diplomatic process where these issues are addressed in a strong diplomatic conversation between a unified ASEAN and China rather than through any kind of coercion," the official said.
Clinton's last visit to Asia was in July, when a meeting of ASEAN foreign ministers in Cambodia failed to reach a consensus on how to deal with China on the South China Sea issue.
She will head to China next, and then to Timor-Leste and Brunei, before rounding out the trip representing the US at the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation meeting in Vladivostok, Russia.
