VietWill to demonstrate for UN attention on China's aggression in South China Sea

VietWill Press Release (VietWill.org)
Berkeley, CA
18 July 2008


Vietnam assumes the president's seat at the United Nations Security Council in July 2008. This event marks a significant hope for many nations in the new world order since it means a small country like Vietnam can make certain level of impact on the outcome of international security issues. This month, Le Luong Minh being Vietnam's Ambassador to the U.N., sets the agenda to discuss for a possible U.N. sanctions against Zimbabwe and the like, and yet no mention about Vietnam's "sore," the South China Sea dispute.

It was the hope of VietWill that Vietnam would take this opportunity in which international attention is focused on it to put forth the issue of the conflict in the South China Sea, in which the Beijing government is seen to be the primary antagonist in pursuit to control the sea and the resources both proven and unproven that lies beneath Paracel and Spratly islands. However, in its first time taking the president's seat, this issue was nowhere to be seen on Vietnam's agenda.

Regretting the loss of this opportunity, VietWill sees it fit to voice its concerns this time to the world about the dangers of a Chinese hegemony in the region. At the Asia security conference in May, the U.S. Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates himself cautioned Beijing on its bullying of its neighbors which he sugarcoated using the term "coercive diplomacy". Taking advantage of the weakness of the individual Southeast Asian countries and the ASEAN's disunited response toward the issue, China is slowly but surely making gains on its quest for control of the region, despite such control is neither justified by historical title nor modern international maritime law.

China forcefully seized both the Paracel and part of the Spratly Islands from Vietnam and the Philippines in recent history, as well as drawing undefined borders around virtually all of the South China Sea. The dispute involves 5 different countries in the region, but any suggestion for a fair resolution through international arbitration, such as the International Court of Justice would be squarely rejected by Beijing. At the same time, China is in a position to threaten severe negative economic and political consequences to its neighbors if they were to take a firm stand toward its aggression. Thus, China's "coercive diplomacy" euphemistically speaking, or "playground bullying", as is the case, becomes the primary method for Beijing to take grab of the land and water resources in the South China Sea at the peril of its smaller neighbors. This bullying has recently gotten more intense with the discovery of a new Chinese nuclear submarine base on the island of Hainan, right on the doorstep of the nuclear-free zone of Southeast Asia, as designated by the 1995 Bangkok Treaty signed by 10 SEA countries.

In light of a need to call for attention to China's aggression in the South China Sea and to urge for more daring and collaborative actions from affected countries, such as the ASEAN bloc, the European Union, NATO, Japan, Korea, and the United States, VietWill will hold a demonstration in front of the United Nations office in San Francisco and New York in July in order to publicize Beijing's unjustified aggression in the South China Sea.

VietWill believes that on the occasion that Vietnam, one of the countries most affected by China's "bullyism", takes the president's seat on the U.N. Security Council, it is a timely opportunity for concerned individuals and groups to bring this matter to the forefront attention so that the day that this matter makes its way onto the U.N. agenda, and even to the ICJ would be sooner rather than later.