China's coast guard said on Monday it had "taken control measures" against several Philippine ships near the disputed Scarborough Shoal in the South China Sea, as Beijing takes steps to assert its territorial claims and maritime rights in the disputed area, Reuters reported, BTA reported.
According to the Chinese coast guard, the Philippines sent more than a dozen of its ships to Scarborough Shoal on Monday, which had approached the shoal from several sides. In response, Chinese maritime police have taken control measures, including verbal warnings, movement restrictions and the use of water cannons.
The Philippines and China are locked in a long-running maritime dispute over the strategic waterway, which has seen regular clashes between coast guard ships and large-scale naval exercises.
China approved plans to turn Scarborough Shoal - which Beijing calls Huangyan Island and is known in the Philippines as Panatag Shoal - into a national nature reserve last week, without announcing its specific boundaries.
Analysts said the move was an attempt by China to take a moral stance in the dispute between Beijing and Manila over the atoll, part of a broader dispute over sovereignty and access to fisheries in the South China Sea, a busy seaway through which more than $3 trillion in annual trade passes.
"On September 16, the Chinese Coast Guard took control measures against a number of Philippine official ships operating illegally in the territorial waters of Scarborough Shoal, in accordance with the law," the coast guard said on its official social media account.
China claims almost all of The South China Sea, which overlaps the exclusive economic zones of Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, and Vietnam. Unresolved disputes have simmered for years over ownership of various islands and territories.