China was reportedly building oil and gas rigs inside Taiwan’s exclusive economic zone, in what analysts claimed was part of a campaign to slowly chip away at the island’s defences and expand Beijing’s control of disputed waters.
Research by the Jamestown Foundation, a Washington-based think tank, said at least 12 vessels and fixed structures belonging to the state-run China National Offshore Oil Corporation (CNOOC) were operating inside Taiwan’s zone, close to the Pratas Islands in the northern South China Sea. Some have been there for several years.
These rigs include some of the largest wellhead platforms in Asia and are supported by jackets – steel bases planted on the seabed that can double as platforms for other uses. The concern, the report said, is that such equipment could support “a full range of coercion, blockade, bombardment and/or invasion scenarios” against Pratas or Taiwan itself.
CNOOC is one of the world’s biggest oil and gas companies, operating in joint ventures around the globe. But as a state-owned firm it is also bound to Beijing’s political ambitions. Its former chairman, Wang Yilin, once described large rigs as “mobile national territory and a strategic weapon”.
The Jamestown report argued that China’s use of commercial energy infrastructure in contested waters fits with its broader “greyzone” tactics – actions that fall short of war but steadily change facts on the ground, or in this case at sea.
China’s latest moves around Taiwan fit into a wider pattern of using oil and gas development to tighten its grip on contested seas. Just last month, Beijing invited foreign firms to bid on nine exploration blocks covering 160,000sqkm of the South China Sea, overlapping with areas claimed by Vietnam. Hanoi condemned the tender as a breach of international law.
But unlike Vietnam, Taiwan has so far not pushed back. That silence, the report warned, risks “normalising sovereignty shaving” and encouraging further encroachment.
Taiwan frequently enforces its EEZ elsewhere, but is in a weaker position around Pratas. The island is not a member of the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) because of its disputed political status, meaning it cannot pursue arbitration through the normal mechanisms. Domestically, its laws are also unclear on which parts of the EEZ it enforces.
Even if Taipei did protest, it does not have the naval or coast guard strength to remove such large assets. Satellite monitoring is also patchy, with structures often hidden by cloud cover. This has given Beijing space to install platforms and keep them in place for years with little risk of international challenge.
The report claims that China’s actions near Pratas fit into a strategy to shrink Taiwan’s room for manoeuvre. In recent years, Beijing has stepped up military drills, flown regular sorties across the median line in the Taiwan Strait, and sent coast guard patrols around Taiwan’s outlying islands. The addition of fixed drilling platforms inside Taiwan’s EEZ is another step in reducing the space Taipei can control.
China’s drilling is not confined to Taiwan’s waters. This week Japan lodged a formal protest after confirming Beijing had set up 21 rigs in disputed parts of the East China Sea. A 2008 agreement between Tokyo and Beijing to jointly develop those gas fields has long been frozen, and Japanese officials fear unilateral drilling could siphon gas from their side of the boundary.
China rejected the protest, insisting the work was taking place in “undisputed waters under China’s jurisdiction”.
Beijing also continues to claim almost the entire South China Sea, a body of water believed to hold rich reserves of oil and gas and which stretches from China to Indonesia and from Vietnam to the Philippines. However, other countries also claim parts of it. A 2016 international tribunal ruling that found China’s claims unlawful.
China’s maritime assertiveness comes at a time when Beijing is also displaying its military strength on land. On Wednesday, president Xi Jinping presided over a vast military parade in central Beijing to mark the 80th anniversary of the end of the Second World War. The event showcased advanced weapons of the People’s Liberation Army, underscoring China’s ability to project power far beyond its shores.
The Independent has reached out to CNOOC for comment.
