The latest clash involving Chinese patrol boats occurred 120km (80 miles) off the south-central coast of Vietnam and some 600km south of China's Hainan island.
According to the Americans, their unarmed ship Impeccable, under naval supervision but with a civilian crew, was peacefully surveying the ocean floor in international waters about 120km (75 miles) south of China's Hainan Island (see map).
North-east of the South China Sea lies a small crop of islands that Japan and China are squabbling over.
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Indeed, since China began to flex its military muscles, declaring sovereignty over the many rocks, reefs and resources of the South China Sea, some of the countries of South-East Asia have been readier to open up their ports and repair yards to visiting American naval ships.
Members of the Association of South-East Asian Nations (ASEAN), alarmed by China's vague, unexplained but sweeping claim to sovereignty over most of the South China Sea, encouraged America to involve itself in the issue.
China has used its own interpretation of LOST to assert control over much of the South China Sea in its quest for access to vast quantities of natural resources, potentially sparking conflict with its neighbors.
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China claims sovereignty over all of the South China Sea.
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He beat both silver medalists, Park Taehwan of South Korea and Yang Sun of China, by 1.79 seconds.
The Philippines, on the western border of the South China Sea, also reported Chinese boats cutting cables of a survey ship and threatening to ram its boats in March, according to Manila's Foreign Ministry.
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Hutchison Wampoa itself is used by Beijing to run commercial ports controlling a preponderance of South China's seaborne commerce.
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China claims a U-shaped swathe of the South China Sea, including areas also claimed by Vietnam, the Philippines, Malaysia and Brunei.
Further, China has made illegal claims to most of the South China Sea and then declared it to be a "core interest, " meaning it is on par with Tibet and Taiwan in importance.
Relations with Vietnam have also worsened in recent years as China has asserted a historic claim to much of the South China Sea, including islands for which the two countries have previously fought for control.
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And the Beijing regime has been at odds with South-East Asian countries over its greedy claim to almost all of the South China Sea.
And the United States objected last summer when China defined its "core interests" as including the distant waters of the South China Sea.
And China has submitted a map that seems to assert ownership of a vast part of the South China sea.
After naval clashes with Vietnam and the Philippines -- which claim parts of the South China Sea alongside Brunei, Malaysia and Taiwan -- China has further angered its neighbours by printing a map of its extensive maritime claim, known as the "nine-dotted line" in new passports.
We recognized the importance of the 2002 ASEAN-China Declaration on the Conduct (DOC) of Parties in the South China Sea and welcomed its implementation.
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In China Daily, Prof Gong Jianhua, a maritime affairs specialist at Guangdong Ocean University, welcomes the new coast guard, but says China should promote joint development with neighbours in the South China Sea on the basis of a China-Asean free trade zone to ease "anxiety and suspicion".
It enjoys immense natural resources and dominance of international trade routes to and from south central China and the Bay of Bengal and the Indian Ocean.
The meeting in Washington was a show of solidarity between the US, Japan and South Korea in the face of China's reluctance to lean on North Korea, the BBC's state department correspondent Kim Ghattas reports.
The most recent results, from tests taken in 2009, have recorded the rise of Asian school systems in countries such as Singapore, South Korea and in parts of China.
Vietnam, the Philippines and Taiwan are also in dispute with China over the sovereignty of islands in the South China Sea.
We learn of gunboats bound for America that change direction to head toward Asia and of international trade being affected by the simultaneous disruption of the flow of cotton from the South and the flow of tea from China.
After the group's reorganization, New Hope was given the feed business for much of south and southwest China.
Other investors with ties to the governments of South Korea and China followed with similar investments in Chesapeake.
Japan, South Korea and much of China will have to get used to living under the shadow of Kim's nuclear umbrella.
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