Japan protests against new Chinese structure in East China Sea

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TOKYO/BEIJING (Reuters) -China has begun construction of a new structure in waters between China and Japan in the disputed East China Sea, the Japanese foreign ministry said on Tuesday, adding it has lodged a protest with China.

The ministry said in a statement “it is extremely regrettable” that China is pressing ahead with unilateral development when the exclusive economic zone and the continental shelf in the East China Sea have not yet been delimited.

Japan requests that China cease its unilateral development and to resume talks on the implementation of a 2008 agreement, in which the two countries agreed to cooperate on natural resources development in the East China Sea, it also said.

Asked about Japan’s protest, China’s foreign ministry said on Wednesday that its oil and gas development activities in the East China Sea were located in undisputed waters under Chinese jurisdiction.

“China does not accept Japan’s groundless accusations,” ministry spokesperson Guo Jiakun told a regular news conference, adding that Beijing was committed to fully implementing the principled consensus on the East China Sea issue.

Japan’s ties with China have been plagued by a territorial dispute over a group of Japanese-administered islands in the East China Sea, called the Senkaku in Japan and Diaoyu in China, as well as the legacy of Japan’s past military aggression.  

(Reporting by Kiyoshi Takenaka in Tokyo, Liz Lee and Xiuhao Chen in Beijing; Editing by Chizu Nomiyama and Michael Perry)