Chinese military conducts patrols in parts of South China Sea, state media reports

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BEIJING (Reuters) -The Chinese military conducted combat readiness patrols in parts of the South China Sea from Monday to Tuesday, Chinese state media reported, in an extension of rare military drills and exercises in the region over the weekend.

The Southern Theater Command of the Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) conducted combat readiness patrols in efforts to improve combat capabilities and maintain peace and stability in the South China Sea region, according to state media reports.

China claims almost the entire South China Sea despite overlapping claims in the busy waterway by Brunei, Malaysia, the Philippines and Vietnam. In 2016 the Permanent Court of Arbitration in the Hague ruled that China’s claims were not supported by international law, a decision that Beijing rejects.

On Saturday, Chinese air and naval forces conducted manoeuvres near the disputed Scarborough shoal after Australia and the Philippines said their militaries would hold joint maritime activities with Japan, New Zealand and the United States in the Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) of the Philippines.

The shoal, about 200 km (124 miles) west of the main Philippine island of Luzon and within the Philippine EEZ, has long been claimed by both Beijing and Manila.

In recent talks with China’s top diplomat Wang Yi in New York, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken raised China’s “dangerous and destabilising actions” in the South China Sea.

Blinken had previously accused Beijing of aggressive deployments in the South China Sea of its coast guard and fishing vessels suspected of being a maritime militia.

(Reporting by Ryan Woo; Editing by Tom Hogue and Michael Perry)