Japan Spots Chinese Warships Near Disputed Gas Field
TOKYO (AFP)
Sep 09, 2005

Japanese authorities said Friday they had seen Chinese warships for the first time near a disputed gas field in the East China Sea which Tokyo recently opened to exploration.

A fleet of five ships, including a 7,940-tonne Sovremenny-class destroyer, had been spotted mid-morning by a Japanese P-3C patrol plane near the Chunxiao gas field, said the Defense Agency's maritime staff office.

The gas field lies just on China's side of what Japan claims to be the median line between their exclusive economic zones. China does not recognize the line.

In November, Japan spotted a Chinese nuclear submarine intruding into what it considers its waters near the gas fields.

Relations between the nations have seriously deteriorated this year over both the gas field and memories of Japan's bloody wartime occupation of China.

Beijing has been incensed at visits to a Tokyo war shrine by Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi, who is predicted to win a general election Sunday which he has kept focused on domestic economic reforms.

The other ships seen Friday were two guided-missile frigates, a supply ship and an intelligence-gathering ship, the Defense Agency said.

The destroyer and the guided-missile frigates circled around the oil rig clockwise, the Jiji Press news agency reported quoting naval officials.

China National Offshore Oil Corp. said last month that it would start gas production in the field by the end of September, drawing a protest from the Japanese foreign ministry.

The fleet activity could possibly be a "demonstration" ahead of the start of gas production," Jiji quoted Japanese government officials as saying.

A series of high-level meetings on the gas dispute between Japan and China has led to no agreement other than to continue dialogue.

In July, China protested against Japan's decision to give permission to a first company, Tokyo-based Teikoku Oil, to explore an area on Japan's side of the middle line.

China began drilling unilaterally in the area in 2003, and Japan is concerned that Chunxiao and another gas field which China is developing stretch into what Tokyo considers its sector.

A Japanese survey in 1999 estimated the disputed fields had a massive 200 billion cubic meters (seven trillion cubic feet) of gas.

Japan and China are two of the world's biggest energy importers and have also clashed over getting priority to an oil pipeline being built in Russia.