China elbows its way into South Korean waters
Satellite photos reveal China is using the cover of global turmoil to push its boundaries deeper into neighbouring territory.
The world's eyes are focused on Ukraine, Gaza and Iran. South Korea has been contending with the fallout of a failed presidential coup.
Meanwhile, Beijing has anchored an enormous deep-sea platform in the disputed waters of the Yellow Sea. And it won't let Seoul get a close look.
China insists it is a service centre for surrounding caged aqua farms.
South Korea, however, has its doubts.
'We are treating this issue with utmost seriousness from the standpoint of protecting our maritime territory,' Korean Minister of Oceans and Fisheries Kang Do-hyung told reporters shortly after an open-sea showdown in April.
International security analysts understand why.
'While available information suggests that the platforms are genuinely focused on aquaculture, concerns that the platforms may be dual-use are not unfounded, given China's track record in the South China Sea,' a new report by the Asia Maritime Transparency Initiative (AMTI) states.
Beijing insisted in 2015 that its massive building campaign in the Spratly Islands was to establish weather stations and air-sea rescue facilities to serve commercial shipping in the area. Why these humanitarian roles require missile launchers, anti-aircraft guns, military-grade piers and runways, hardened hangars, ammunition bunkers, and barracks remains unexplained.
The new structure is in waters previously agreed to be shared until arbitration under the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) decided who owned what.
That agreement, however, now appears surplus to Beijing's needs.
Megastructure manoeuvres
The hulking steel rig is called Atlantic Amsterdam. It was built for the offshore oil industry. It's now supposed to be the front office of a Chinese fish farm complex.
But it's not the only structure Beijing has deployed in the supposedly shared Provisional Measures Zone (PMZ). Two giant steel aquaculture cages are fattening and harvesting fish.
'Even without further expansion, the platforms are likely already collecting data that could have value for undersea navigation and detection,' Centre for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) analysts Jennifer Jun and Victor Cha assess in the AMSTI report.
The former offshore oil platform is certainly overkill for its new job.
The 85m wide, six-storey high structure can accommodate more than 100 people. That's far beyond what's needed for its stated 'central integrated management' role – if limited to aquaculture.
Chinese state-controlled media touts the facility as including a marine science laboratory, research centre, production management facilities, and tourist accommodations.
'With the platform as the landing point, more cages can be built around it …[and] the scale of deep-sea aquaculture can be continuously expanded,' it adds.
Seoul isn't convinced.
'China's method of installing the (Atlantic Amsterdam) structure is similar to its tactic of creating artificial islands in the South China Sea,' People Power Party MP Kweon Seong-dong told Korea Herald.
A Stanford University's SeaLight maritime security research project satellite photo assessment found the Atlantic Amsterdam was anchored in the disputed territory in October 2022. It replaced a much smaller rig placed there two years earlier.
For Chinese eyes only
South Korea has, until recently, kept its concerns about China's expanding infrastructure to itself. News of the increasing tensions only emerged in April.
That was when details of a February high seas clash between South Korean and Chinese Coast Guard vessels became public.
The South Korean fisheries research vessel Onnuri was sent into the PMZ to verify Chinese accounts of its new fish farm.
But it sits within a treaty 'grey zone'.
'While ships from both sides are allowed to fish within the PMZ, aquaculture is entirely unmentioned by the 2001 fisheries agreement,' AMTI states. '(This leaves) an ambiguity that will make it difficult for Seoul to convince Beijing to remove the platforms.'
It appears Beijing believes the structure falls outside the scope of Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) definitions, and its PMZ compromise with Seoul.
'South Korean requests for China to relocate the structures outside of the PMZ have not only been repeatedly rejected, but the Chinese government has also unilaterally declared 'no-sail' zones within the PMZ and has deployed at least 13 additional buoys in the Yellow Sea since 2018,' AMTI adds.
In February, South Korea's Onnuri fisheries research vessel was challenged by Chinese Coast Guard vessels within the shared waters. It was then forcefully redirected away from the steel platform.
South Korean sources claim plain-clothed Chinese officials approached the Onnuri in inflatable dinghies while waving knives in the air.
AMTI says 'multiple' similar attempts to approach the area, 'often accompanied by South Korean coast guard escorts', had been blocked since 2022.
Beijing has not said why a fish farm is so politically sensitive.
'(Seoul) may suspect there is more happening there than just aquaculture, such as signals intelligence operations,' Stanford University SeaLight director Ray Powell told US media.
International lawfare
South Korea has protested to China that anchoring the structures inside the Yellow Sea PMZ presents potential navigation hazards for South Korean fishing vessels. It adds that the lack of consultation over their presence breached its treaty rights.
China rejects the allegations.
It insists the structures have nothing to do with the PMZ treaty, are 'located in China's coastal waters' (which UNCLOS is yet to determine) and are a reasonable use of its offshore resources.
China calls it the Yellow Sea. South Korea calls it the West Sea.
Their dispute arises from the UNCLOS definition (which Beijing is a signatory to) that an Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) extends 370km from a nation's shores – unless it overlaps with that of another. The EEZ gives commercial access to the owner state to the zone's fishing and natural resources. But international vessels are free to travel over it.
Beijing and Seoul formalised their competing claim in 2001. The Provisional Measures Zone (PMZ) requires approval from both states before any commercial activities can take place there.
'The agreement allows fishing activities from both sides but does not authorise other actions such as the installation of fixed structures, which could impact future maritime boundary negotiations,' AMTI states.
Beijing says no.
'The aquaculture facilities set up by Chinese company in the PMZ do not contravene the agreement between China and the ROK,' Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Guo Jiakun told a press briefing.
Last month, Seoul decided to test Beijing's argument.
It has deployed its own large floating structure in the PMZ. Minister of Oceans and Fisheries Kang Do-hyung said the platform was for 'environmental investigation'.
Surveillance staging post
South Korea's parliament has been too busy for the past 18 months to address the growing tensions.
It had to contend with the impeachment and removal of former President Yoon Suk-yeol after he declared martial law in an effort to sideline opposition parties.
'China has not allowed a good crisis to go to waste,' Korea Institute for Maritime Strategy Jun Kajee told Newsweek. 'Beijing insists these are private-sector projects for economic development, dismissing sovereignty concerns as overreactions.
'However, China's refusal to halt construction – even as South Korean survey vessels face coast guard blockades – reveals a strategic intent to normalise its presence.'
South Korea has reported a steady increase in the activity of Chinese naval vessels in the PMZ in recent years. It's also ramped up the frequency of declaring 'no-sail zones' for war games.
The Korea JoongAng Daily news service reports China deployed warships within 'South Korean controlled waters' some 170 times between January and May. Chinese surveillance ships had also been regularly entering the vicinity of Kunsan Air Base – the United States Air Force's Eighth Fighter Wing headquarters.
'The presence of these sensor-equipped ships suggests that China is likely engaged in some level of intelligence-gathering,' a South Korean defence official told the news service.
'While it is difficult to officially assess the intent of another country's military activities, it is presumed that China is seeking to expand its regional influence.'
South Korea carried out a crisis-resolution national election on June 3.
On June 4, Seoul finally had a constitutionally acceptable President – Lee Jae-myung.
China's Chairman, Xi Jinping, quickly put him in his place.
Xi wants South Korea to 'inject more certainty into the chaotic regional and international situation.'
'Respecting each other's core interests and major concerns will help maintain the right course of bilateral relations and ensure steady progress,' he said in a statement.
'A healthy, stable, and continuously deepening China-South Korea relationship aligns with the trends of the times, serves the fundamental interests of both peoples, and contributes to regional and global peace, stability, and prosperity.'
President Lee has indicated compliance, stating he sought 'pragmatic diplomacy' after years of Seoul 'unnecessarily antagonising' Beijing.
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