A Dutch warship was harassed by Chinese military aircraft in the East China Sea on Friday, the Netherlands said, becoming the latest country to accuse Beijing’s forces of initiating potentially unsafe encounters in international waters.

In a statement Friday, the Dutch Defense Ministry said two Chinese fighter jets circled the frigate HNLMS Tromp several times, while its marine patrol helicopter was “approached” by two Chinese warplanes and a helicopter during a patrol.

“This created a potentially unsafe situation,” the statement said.

  • OpenStars@discuss.online
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    5 months ago

    So China acts aggressively while blaming the US, just like Russia blamed the invasion of Ukraine on the West too. It seems like I’ve heard this playbook before…

    “Stop hitting yourself, stop hitting yourself. Look what you made me do!?”

  • Flying Squid@lemmy.worldM
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    5 months ago

    Don’t fuck with the Dutch, China. They’ll get all colonize the spice islands on your ass. (No offense to the indigenous islanders.)

  • CanadaPlus@lemmy.sdf.org
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    5 months ago

    The news to me is that it hadn’t happened specifically to the Dutch until now.

    One of these days they’re actually going to collide with something or someone, and then we’ll have another fun international crisis point.

  • AutoTL;DR@lemmings.worldB
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    5 months ago

    This is the best summary I could come up with:


    A Dutch warship was harassed by Chinese military aircraft in the East China Sea on Friday, the Netherlands said, becoming the latest country to accuse Beijing’s forces of initiating potentially unsafe encounters in international waters.

    The Tromp was operating in the East China Sea in support of a multinational coalition enforcing United Nations sanctions on North Korea, known as the Pacific Security Maritime Exchange (PSMX), according to a statement from the European Union.

    Last month, Australia accused a Chinese fighter jet of firing flares into the path of a naval helicopter operating from the destroyer HMAS Hobart over international waters of the Yellow Sea.

    The incident was similar to an encounter in late October, when Canada said a Chinese fighter jet fired flares into the path of a Canadian military helicopter over the South China Sea.

    Two weeks before the South China Sea encounter, a Royal Canadian Air Force patrol plane reported an unsafe intercept by a Chinese jet while it was supporting the UN enforcement of sanctions on North Korea.

    “The US keeps creating chaos and has become the source of risks, as well as the destroyer to peace and stability in the Asia-Pacific region,” Jing Jianfeng, deputy chief of the Joint Staff Department at China’s Central Military Commission, told reporters in Singapore.


    The original article contains 686 words, the summary contains 209 words. Saved 70%. I’m a bot and I’m open source!

  • febra@lemmy.world
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    5 months ago

    Why is North Korea under sanctions?

    EDIT: People downvoting but I’m genuinely curious which exact sanctions the Dutch are enforcing here

    • Womble@lemmy.world
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      5 months ago

      maybe read the article?

      The Tromp was operating in the East China Sea in support of a multinational coalition enforcing United Nations sanctions on North Korea, known as the Pacific Security Maritime Exchange (PSMX), according to a statement from the European Union.

      The UN Security Council has passed multiple resolutions since 2006 imposing sanctions on North Korea for its nuclear weapons program.

  • zephyreks@lemmy.ml
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    5 months ago

    It’s international waters, but simultaneously you’re not allowed to fly in them? You’re not allowed to follow standard intercept procedures in them? I guess China could just claim the entire East China Sea under its ADIZ like the US did off the Pacific Coast and off the Aleutians, but China didn’t. ADIZ isn’t an internationally protected rule, anyway, so my understanding is that China only does the equivalent of ADIZ intercepts for operators it deems hostile instead of enforcing ADIZ rigidly.

  • BilboBargains@lemmy.world
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    5 months ago

    Former colonial powers are accused of doing colonial stuff again. Obviously China is the bad guy for attempting to prevent this violation.

    • afraid_of_zombies@lemmy.world
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      5 months ago

      Dang it, why did Britian and the US order China to harass the Dutch ship? Stupid Britian and US always causing problems, just yesterday I got a canker sore and I am pretty sure MI5 is behind it. Save us North Korea!

  • TechNerdWizard42@lemmy.world
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    5 months ago

    There is no such thing as international waters. China’s exclusive economic zone is one of 17 in the world that cannot be sailed through or flown through without prior authorization and only for peaceful transfer. No “war games” and no deployment of weapons. Just passage with prior authorization.

    The Dutch and Australians have violated this and are now complaining.

    Also this week in the news, Russia is sending ships off the coast of Cuba for similar war games. The coverage in the US is about escalation and being provocative.

    Which is it? Stop being such stupid hypocrites.

    Also for any of you stupid Americans still wondering there is a reason the US and NATO does this just like a reason Russia does it. You try and provoke a response so that the potential combatant airplane and naval vessels make an appearance. Then you capture and study every reflection and image you can to see if they have adapted or changed. Also why the US and China and Russia all fit extra useless bits onto their ships and planes as both decoys and radar signature invalidators. You want your stuff to look as shit as possible visibly and via radar because you’re being spied on.

    Make no doubt this is why this is happening.

    Edit: Americans are yet again proven to be fucking stupid.

    • TranscendentalEmpire@lemm.ee
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      5 months ago

      There is no such thing as international waters. China’s exclusive economic zone is one of 17

      I mean this is just definitionally wrong. You can’t acknowledge the existence of exclusive economic zones without also recognizing international and territorial waters.

      “The difference between the territorial sea and the exclusive economic zone is that the first confers full sovereignty over the waters, whereas the second is merely a “sovereign right” which refers to the coastal state’s rights below the surface of the sea. The surface waters are international waters.[2”

      The Dutch and Australians have violated this and are now complaining.

      No, the Chinese government is trying to both have their cake and eat it. They are acknowledging the idea of internationally recognized law, but ignoring the aspects they do not want to adhere to.

      By definition economic exclusion zones only apply to the resources beneath the surface, the surface itself is international waters. The water people are allowed to protect as if it were sovereign land is only territorial waters, which extend 200 miles from the recognized Continental shelf.

      • zephyreks@lemmy.ml
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        5 months ago

        Actually, this isn’t the full story. Military activities in a nation’s EEZ is a point of contention: countries like Brazil, India, Pakistan, China, Iran, Malaysia, and Indonesia object to this. It’s not explicitly defined in UNCLOS whether military activities should be permitted, and it’s the prevailing view of countries that make up almost half of the world’s population that it shouldn’t be. International law hasn’t really been extensively challenged in this regard until very recently (the past decade or two), so the debate on military activities within EEZ is still that, a debate.

        • TranscendentalEmpire@lemm.ee
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          5 months ago

          It’s not explicitly defined in UNCLOS whether military activities should be permitted,

          Meaning there is no provision against it. Article 87 and 58 are both very broad in their protections to any state operating outside of territorial waters, there is no reason to assume the freedom of movement only applies to commercial vessels.

          so the debate on military activities within EEZ is still that, a debate.

          Only so much that international law in and of itself is still up for debate. If that’s your argument then the notion of international law is moot, and we will be doomed to regress fully back to might makes right foreign policy.

          I also feel as if you are attempting to narrow the argument into a specific corridor that suits the Chinese perspective. Yes there are countries that disagree with the broad protections offered by the current international law, but that’s not the only problem China has been rubbing against in regards to LOSC. They aren’t just attempting to govern military movements in their EEZ, they are attempting to expand it, and police the movement of both military and commercial traffic.

          I mean, they basically have a paramilitary fishing fleet that aggressively and violently violates other countries EEZ and territorial waters all the time.

          reference, it’s mostly the big ex-colonial maritime trading powers that are in support of this because it makes their trade easier, while those countries who exercise coastal rights and natural resource exploration rights are opposed.

          I think the point of LOSC is to deescalate points of contentions in spaces where we all have to operate. The rights of freedom of movement serves China just as much as it does the United States.

          • zephyreks@lemmy.ml
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            5 months ago

            I think, I feel

            Ok, glad that we agree that we’re operating in a grey zone for international law. I respect your opinion.

            • TranscendentalEmpire@lemm.ee
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              5 months ago

              I think, I feel

              Yeah, it’s an opinion. Just like yours, I just don’t pretend to represent opinions as facts.

              operating in a grey zone for international law.

              Yeah, I mean what else can you expect from a system that was fabricated to substantiate the clean wehrmacht theory?

              But, if we’re sticking to the main topic. According to UNCLOS, travel in everything but territorial water has pretty broad protections.

              Whether international law is enforceable, logical, or ethical is a different debate that I wouldn’t want to throw my hat into.

              • zephyreks@lemmy.ml
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                5 months ago

                According to UNCLOS, which the US isn’t signatory to? Some “international” ass law

                • TranscendentalEmpire@lemm.ee
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                  5 months ago

                  Right, but we are talking about China whom are signatories…

                  Like I said, your issue seems to be raised at the concept of international law. Not the individual international agreement we have been speaking about.

    • nonailsleft@lemm.ee
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      5 months ago

      I don’t think anyone in the US is calling this “escalation and being provocative”

      Almost everything I read is them joking about Russia’s Black Sea fleet getting dunked on and now ‘flexing’ that they can still sail to Havana. You won’t see US planes doing mock runs towards these ships, nor Biden claiming Cuba is US territory.

    • i2ndshenanigans@lemmy.world
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      5 months ago

      What coverage in the US is saying Russia is provoking or escalating? Everything I’ve read was the US was monitoring Russian Warships in Cuba and all have said it’s pretty much a non issue.

    • Skua@kbin.earth
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      5 months ago

      If China doesn’t agree with these sanctions then maybe China should stop voting for them in the UNSC. It did so at least four times in 2017 alone.

      • Canadian_anarchist@lemmy.ca
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        5 months ago

        China does flout the trade embargo with NK though. It’s very one sided in China’s favour, and there’s even an exclusive train line from Dan Dong into NK. China sells NK consumer goods, and then extracts natural resources using cheap NK labour.

    • catloaf@lemm.ee
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      5 months ago

      Economic sanctions are the non-violent option. Actual violence would be guns and bombs. If you want to equate the two, war would be the more efficient option, so I don’t think you want to imply that it’s acceptable.

    • afraid_of_zombies@lemmy.world
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      5 months ago

      Ok everyone stop trading with this country = oppression

      Ok everyone trade with this country = believe it or not, also oppression

      Shouldn’t you be happy that the people of North Korea are free of evil capitalism commerce and technology? That no one is inflicting an economic system on them.

      Get your grievances organized. You are free to yell contradictions but few will take it seriously