March 12:
China will include Ieo Island, a submerged rock controlled by South Korea, in regular maritime patrols and deploy its first aircraft carrier there in August. The chief of China’s State Oceanic Administration said the inlet is in waters under Chinese control, causing Seoul to call in the Chinese ambassador and consider lodging an official complaint, the Choson Ilbo reports. Ieo Island is 149 km off the southern coast of Jeju, South Korea and is closer to South Korea than China. Seoul is building a maritime research station there. A country cannot claim submerged rocks as territory; the question is whether the waters are under Chinese or Korean control.
March 14:
On January 12 two Myanmar soldiers illegally crossed into China and killed a Chinese civilian execution-style. Lahpai Zau Lawn, a 53-year-old ethnic Kachin farmer in Yunnan Province, was shot at close range in the abdomen and head and landmines were planted around his body, the semi- official Global Timesnewspaper reports. “The Chinese side has lodged solemn representations with the Myanmar side asking it to quickly find out the truth, punish the murderers and compensate the bereaved families and strengthen the education and supervision of the border army,” China’s Foreign Ministry spokesman said. The incident may have been a reprisal after two Myanmar soldiers crossed the border into China in December in search of food and were detained by local villagers and handed over to Chinese authorities.
[Editor’s Note: In February a similar incident happened on the China-North Korea border. Four armed North Korean soldiers entered China where they robbed and killed a family of four, The Korea Herald reported.]
March 20:
China and the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) have announced plans for a $1 billion fund for Latin America, the BBC reports. The fund will make equity investments and finance public and private sector projects in the region. State-owned Export-Import Bank of China and IDB will invest $150 million each with the remainder to be raised from the market. Aside from a few loans-for-oil and some smaller loans, every loan requires the borrower to purchase Chinese construction, telecommunications, satellite, and train equipment. China is the fastest-growing foreign investor in Latin America and accounts for almost 9% of investment into the region. Beijing is keen to secure supplies of Latin America’s abundant natural resources including oil and iron ore as well as gain infrastructure construction contracts for its state-run firms.
March 23:
Construction on China’s North-South water diversion project and the resettlement of affected residents are accelerating, with some water channels set to be operational soon and the central channel scheduled to open in 2014, according to Vice Premier Li Keqiang, who is in charge of the project The project is aimed at helping transport water from the south to the arid north, which suffers frequent droughts. Beijing and the neighboring city of Tianjin have received about 40 percent less precipitation this winter than in previous years, Li said. Construction on the project was begun in late 2002. In 2011 57.8 billion yuan ($9.2 billion) was invested in the project, while total spending on the diversion project has reached 137.6 billion yuan ($22 billion), according to a press release by China’s Minister of Water Resources.
March 24:
Water shortages, pollution and environmental degredation are undermining China’s economic development, said Hu Siyi, vice minister of water resources, in comments carried by the official PLA Daily. About two-thirds of Chinese cities are water-needy, while nearly 300 million rural residents lack access to safe drinking water, leading to a national water shortage of over 50 billion cubic meters on average every year. “Excessive exploitation have caused a range of environmental problems,” Hu said. “China's accelerating industrialization and urbanization will create more pressure to meet demand for water in the future.” China's average per capita water resources amount to only 2100 cubic meters annually, or about 28 percent of the global average.
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