China to remove West Sea structures, Korean president says

SHANGHAI — South Korea and China will seek to clearly divide maritime borders in disputed areas of the West Sea, as conflicts have emerged over large-scale installations there set up by China, President Lee Jae Myung said Wednesday. China has expressed its intention to partially withdraw them, he said. Lee made the comments two days after his summit with Chinese President Xi Jinping, where the West Sea structures were on the agenda. The conflict surrounds structures China deployed in 2022 within the Provisional Measures Zone (PMZ), an area where the exclusive economic zones (EEZs) of the two countries overlap in the West Sea, a shallow body of water between China and the Korean Peninsula. While China has claimed the facilities are for marine farming, South Korea has viewed them as China’s infringement of its maritime rights and a part of China’s “gray zone” tactics. “China’s position is that the facilities are simply aquaculture farms. From our perspective, the issue is why such installations were set up unilaterally by China in the area where the two countries are supposedWeiter zum vollständigen Artikel bei Korea Times Weiter zum vollständigen Artikel bei Korea Times