South China Sea: US says China taking 'self-isolating' steps

US said it will "fly, sail and operate" whatever international law permits there.

The US on Friday said China is taking some steps that are "self-isolating" with regard to the South China Sea and the US will "fly, sail and operate" whatever international law permits there.

"I am not one of those people who believe that conflict between China and the US is inevitable. It is certainly not desirable and I don't think it is likely. The US will fly, sail and operate whatever international law permits in the South China Sea," said US Defence Secretary Ash Carter.

"We don't seek to ask people to take sides. We do know that people are coming to us increasingly. Why is that? It is because China is taking some steps that I fear are self-isolating, driving towards a result that none of us wants," he said, in reference to Chinese measures in the South China Sea.

Speaking at the World Economic Forum in Davos on the issue of global security, Carter said he expects "the security problem of few against the many will be with us for a long time." Participating in the session, Afghanistan President Ashraf Ghani said, "We need to understand that we are dealing with medium, not short term challenges. We must understand terrorism as an ecology with both competition and cooperation."

According to him, terrorism is directed towards theatre and to call into question the relationship between the state and the citizen. NATO Secretary Gerneral Jens Stoltenberg said more and more states are in a state blurred between war and peace today and NATO's challenge is to respond to a more fragile and more dangerous security environment. On the other hand, Carter said there is a new playbook for NATO.

Ghani also said the private sector can be great partners in the mission to create stability. "As long as we're having exclusion of women, we will never have stability," he added. Political will is not an abstraction, it is a concrete sort of steps to make choices between difficult options, Ghani said, adding that there is need to come out with plans that are deliverable in Afghanistan.

Singapore Deputy Prime Minister Tharman Shammugaratnam said China is a dominant trading partner country for virtually every East Asian nation. About Singapore, he said it is the most religiously diverse nation in the world. "We are living with a legacy of decades of segregation and a culture of exclusion...," he noted. Mixed neighbourhoods, workplaces and classrooms are critical for stability, he emphasised.

(Source : dnaindia.com)

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