Spratlys spat spawns sparks

China's ambitions to establish a secure area of maritime influence around its ocean shores will lead to direct clashes with its many neighbours. The vital commercial routes through the South China Sea are of great importance to all Asian states, but this rivalry is further inflamed by hopes of oil being found in these deep waters.

Much of the attention in this dispute has focused on the conflicting claims of China, the Philippines, Taiwan, Brunei and Malaysia, for all or part of the potentially oil-rich Spratly Islands at the south end of the South China Sea. All claimants except Brunei have troops based on some of the 100 small islands that make up the Spratlys.

Recently there has been no violence, but in 1988 China attacked one of the islands under Vietnamese military control and killed 64 soldiers. Tension has mounted in recent weeks and the Philippines and Vietnam have both complained of increasing harassment of their fishermen in the region by Chinese vessels.

It is important that these territorial and maritime claims are sorted out without recourse to war. Violence is not the way to find a mutually-agreed long-term solution, which is where this issue should end.