Vietnam has lodged a protest against China after the giant neighbor held live-fired exercises and announced plans to build a new island city and logistics base within Vietnam’s Hoang Sa (Paracel) Islands in the South China Sea. 
Vietnam's Ministry of Foreign Affairs Spokeswoman Le Thi Thu Hang. Photo: MOFA
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Chinese drills on March 22-24 and the building plans on Vietnam’s Woody Island, Tree and Drummond Islets in Hoang Sa seriously violate Vietnamese sovereignty, according to MOFA.
Hang reiterated that Vietnam’s jurisdiction over the two island groups is undeniable, proved through historical evidences.
Hanoi urged Beijing to stop the activities and ensure no recurrence in Vietnam’s Hoang Sa and Truong Sa (Spratly) archipelagos to avoid escalating tensions in the region, Hang stated.
Chinese expansionism
Illustrative photo
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Security analysts assess the scheme as a further step in Beijing’s evolving multi-phased plan to declare a South China Sea exclusion zone, including an Air Defense Identification Zone (ADIZ) that would effectively turn the sea into China’s internal waters.
Beijing has turned the Fiery Cross, Mischief and Subi reefs in Spratly into fully fledged islands, on which it has installed a number of military and civilian facilities.
China’s recent deployment of advanced weapons systems to specific features have raised concerns about freedom of navigation and overflight, signaling a great power conflict with the US.
China currently controls Hoang Sa after it violently seized the islands in the hands of South Vietnam in January 1974.
At present, Beijing claims almost the entire South China Sea through the self-claimed nine-dash line. The Permanent Court of Arbitration (PCA) in The Hague made an invalid judgment over the claim in a lawsuit lodged by the Philippines.
China unilaterally took control over the majority of the island groups and showed its expansionism by continuous building of military structures in the islands.
Beijing has chased away fishing boats operating in the archipelagos and violently attacked Vietnamese fishermen when they did fishing within Vietnam’s territorial waters.
