The Malaysian Navy announces the acquisition of China's second coastal mission ship and promises to continue searching for missing Chinese tourists

FX168 Financial News (Hong Kong) News The Royal Malaysian Navy announced that it has acquired China’s second coastal mission ship (LMS), which will later serve at the Kota Kinabalu Naval Military Base. The speedboat carrying about 30 Chinese tourists and local crew sank when it was heading from Kota Kinabalu to the famous scenic spot in Sabah around the beach. After full search and rescue, 25 people have been rescued. With the arrival of the coastal mission ship, Adam Aziz, director of the Kota Kinabalu district of the Malaysian maritime law enforcement agency responsible for coordinating the search and rescue units, said that the meeting decided to recommend to the superior to continue the search mission.

The coastal mission ship provided by China is named Sundang, which is the second of the four coastal mission ship contracts signed by Putrajaya, Malaysia and China Shipbuilding Industry International Co., Ltd. in 2017. The Malaysian Navy’s Strategic Communications Department stated in a statement that the ship will sail to Malaysia in the third week of this month and will serve at the Navy’s Kota Kinabalu base later. The head of the Malaysian Navy, Abdullah, will be in charge of handling mission ship affairs and will be managed by a committee composed of three government representatives.

The statement also mentioned: “The committee headed by Abdullah, the project leader of the Navy’s coastal mission ship, has checked all the ship’s documents, conducted physical tests, and conducted exercises on its capabilities. Before handing over to the Malaysian government , Sundang has successfully passed a number of ports and offshore tests. Its construction started in Wuhan, China on October 23, 2018, and was launched on July 12, 2019. Putrajaya is scheduled to receive it on April 12 last year. Sundang, but was delayed due to the impact of the new crown pneumonia epidemic. The remaining ships will be handed over in September and November this year.”

The Chinese Consulate General in Kota Kinabalu confirmed that 3 of the 23 Chinese tourists found were tragically killed, and several tourists are still missing. A few days ago, local fishermen recovered a female corpse near the sunken ship. As the corpse was highly decomposed, Adam Aziz said that the identity of the body is still unidentifiable. It is reported that the current search area covers Sabah, Miri and Brunei waters, with 11 ships and 4 aircraft participating in the search operation. About 50 fishermen’s association fishing boats installed trawls to assist in search operations in Kota Kinabalu, Kudat and Labuan. Adam Aziz said that the focus of future search work will be to locate the sea area where the female body was found. The owner of the wrecked Chinese ship pleaded guilty in court on the same day, and the court will reopen on the 28th of this month. Earlier, a crew member was sentenced to 6 months in prison for the crime of overloading a commercial vessel.

When it comes to maritime cooperation between China and Malaysia, we have to mention that China and Malaysia have overlapping claims in the South China Sea. The Chinese Coast Guard entered and parked in the Beikang Shoal in the sea north of Borneo in November last year. Luconia Shoals), the Royal Malaysian Navy immediately deployed warship countermeasures, and Malaysian warships continued to track Chinese ships. The Beikang Shoal is regarded by Malaysia as the country’s economic sea area, while the Beijing authorities claim sovereignty over this sea area. The Center for Strategic and International Issues (CSIS) pointed out that the Chinese Coast Guard is believed to want to warn Malaysia’s oil rigs to stop operations because the Chinese Coast Guard has also acted in other recent cases involving offshore drilling in Malaysia and Vietnam.

CSIS also stated in its statement that citing recent circumstances, China may use further military deployments to aggravate the deadlock (with Malaysia). However, the stalemate situation may also worsen because drilling operations so close to the coast of Malaysia and disrupting it is a major provocation. Oh Ei Sun, a senior researcher at the Singapore Institute of International Affairs, said: “Malaysia is not so much chasing the Chinese Coast Guard, it is more like covering them. If you ask whether it will have a long-term deterrent effect, I can say frankly, I don’t think so.”

The new Chinese ambassador to Malaysia, Ouyang Yujing’s rich experience in maritime affairs has attracted the attention of Malaysian maritime researchers. Ngeow Chow Bing, director of the Chinese Society Research Center of the University of Malaya, pointed out that Ouyang Yujing has both land borders and maritime affairs. With rich experience, he will work in Malaysia under this background. It is foreseeable that he will want to integrate more with Malaysia in South China Sea affairs. It is also very possible to revitalize the bilateral maritime consultation mechanism reached between the two countries in 2019.

According to the joint agreement between the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea and the 2016 arbitration award, Malaysia requires an extension of 200 nautical miles of seabed and sea areas from its coast, including the extension of the continental shelf that the country submitted with Vietnam in 2009. China opposes most of Malaysia’s maritime claims and claims that the sea area belongs to China’s nine-dash line, which is a geographical indication. It is 2,000 kilometers away from mainland China and can reach the waters near Malaysia, Vietnam and the Philippines. Nevertheless, the relationship between Malaysia and the Beijing government is more stable than its neighbors in ASEAN, and the two countries also agreed to establish a maritime bilateral consultation mechanism in 2019. The Malaysian side stated that the problems between the two sides are very difficult and complicated, and there is no clear solution in the future.