BEIJING China said Sunday its navy will stage live-ammunition drills in the Yellow Sea this week, after Beijing condemned recent and planned U.S.-South Korean joint naval exercises there and vowed to respond in kind.
Beijing has said last months U.S.-South Korea joint naval drills in the Yellow Sea risked heightening tensions on the Korean peninsula and ignored Chinas objections to any foreign military exercises off its coast.
The Beihai Fleet of the Chinese Peoples Liberation Army Navy will conduct exercises from Wednesday to Saturday in the sea off the southeast coast of Qingdao city, where the fleet is headquartered, the official Xinhua News Agency said, citing the defense ministry.
The drills are routine, annual training mostly involving the shooting of shipboard artillery, Xinhua said. Calls to the ministrys offices rang unanswered Sunday.
The United States and South Korea have planned additional joint maneuvers in the sea early next month, although no dates have been announced. The drills have been a source of friction in what has been a difficult year for relations between the Chinese and U.S. militaries. Although the Yellow Sea consists mostly of international waters, China regards it as lying within its vaguely defined security perimeter.
The militarys newspaper, Peoples Liberation Army Daily, said in an editorial condemning the upcoming exercises signed by Maj. Gen. Luo Yuan, a frequent outspoken commentator on military matters: "If no one harms me, I harm no one, but if someone harms me, I must harm them."
China has recently given an unusual degree of publicity to a series of military drills and live-firing exercises along its eastern coastline � seen by some as a direct response to the U.S.-South Korean exercises.
Earlier this month, China lashed out at a Pentagon report accusing its military of excessive secrecy and warned the report could further damage ties between their armed forces.
China was also upset by statements last month by U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton seen as unwelcome interference in the territorial dispute between China and Southeast Asian nations over the South China Sea, which China claims in its entirety, along with the myriad tiny islands lying within it.
In January, Beijing suspended contacts with the U.S. military as retaliation for a $6.4 billion arms sale to Taiwan, the self-governing island China claims as its own territory.
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