South Korea has stepped up its enforcement of Chinese fishing operations within the U.S. ally’s maritime zone.
The crackdown is in response to an anticipated uptick in these “illegal activities,” Yonhap News Agency cited the South Korean coast guard’s western regional headquarters as saying Thursday.
Autumn is a peak season for fishing in the Yellow Sea, known as the West Sea in Korea, and the agency pointed out fishing grounds appeared in waters off the southwestern coast earlier this month.
Seoul’s maritime authorities said that from Wednesday afternoon, large numbers of Chinese vessels had been gathering near southwestern islands, including South Jeolla Province’s Gageo Island, with some attempting to sail inter Korean waters without permission.
In response, the coast guard scrambled a patrol plane to carry out “low-altitude force maneuvers” and broadcast radio warnings to force 12 of the ships out of the area.
Additionally, a 3,000-ton coast guard cutter operating out of the city of Mokbo intercepted four fishing ships. An inspection determined the ships were not in violation of fishing laws.
“We have established a plan to respond to illegal Chinese boats during the peak fishing season and are conducting preemptive and strong crackdowns,” the news outlet cited Western headquarters chief Lee Myung-joon as saying. “We will do our utmost to protect fish stocks and safeguard maritime sovereignty.”
Chinese fishing operations in South Korea’s exclusive economic zone (EEZ) have for years been a point of contention between the neighbors. The United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) accords coastal states with the sole right to natural resources within their EEZs, which extend 200 nautical miles (230 miles) off the coastline.
Beijing has maintained its fishermen operate in accordance with UNCLOS, with the Chinese embassy in the U.S. previously telling Newsweek the country has been a leader in setting “voluntary fishing moratoriums in certain parts of the high sea.”
Newsweek reached out to the Chinese Foreign Ministry and South Korean Coast Guard via emailed requests for a response.
Last week, two Chinese vessels were seized on suspicion of illicit fishing, with the coast guard saying they had intruded into restricted waters some 50 miles southwest of Socheong Island, near the de facto maritime boundary between South and North Korea.
The agency said it had confiscated a large catch of small fish from one of the boasts and ejected another 28 Chinese vessels from nearby waters.
China’s commercial fishing fleet, the world’s largest with an estimated over half a million ships, is often accused of illegal, unreported, and unregulated fishing, threatening ecosystems and fish stocks worldwide and the anglers who rely on them for their livelihoods.
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