Tension Today: China's Maritime Militia Swarms Philippine Held Island in South China Sea

The Philippines this week said it continued to track dozens of armed Chinese fishing vessels around a disputed island in the South China Sea, part of Beijing's gray zone efforts to assert sweeping claims in the energy-rich waters. The now-common activity was documented over the weekend by the Philippine Coast Guard, which said 42 Chinese maritime militia vessels, accompanied by a slowly loitering naval and coast guard presence, were anchored neared the island of Thitu, which Manila calls Pag-asa and Beijing calls Zhongye.

Beijing asserts a historic right over the South China Sea and all of its associated features, but its ambitious maritime and territorial claims were dismissed in 2016 by an arbitral tribunal in The Hague for contravening the 1982 U.N. Convention on the Law of the Sea, of which China is a signatory. China's leaders have rejected the verdict ever since, leading to tensions with the U.S., which has said it is committed to freedom of the seas.

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