China holds landing exercises in disputed seas

China's navy conducts island landing exercises deep in disputed territory of South China Sea

Associated Press -

BEIJING (AP) -- China's increasingly powerful navy paid a symbolic visit to the country's southernmost territorial claim deep in the South China Sea this week as part of military drills in the disputed Spratly Islands involving amphibious landings and aircraft.

The visit to James Shoal, reported by state media, followed several days of drills starting Saturday and marked a high-profile show of China's determination to stake its claim to territory disputed byVietnam, the Philippines, Taiwan, Malaysia and Brunei amid rising tensions in the region.

Sailors joined in the ceremony Tuesday aboard the amphibious ship Jinggangshan just off the collection of submerged rocks, located 80 kilometers (50 miles) off the coast of Malaysia and about 1,800 kilometers (1,120 miles) from the Chinese mainland, the official Xinhua News Agency reported Wednesday. China planted a monument on the shoal in 2010 declaring it Chinese territory.

Sailors gathered on the ship's helicopter deck declared their loyalty to the ruling Communist Party and vowed to "struggle arduously to realize the dream of a powerful nation," Xinhua said.

The four-ship task force is headed next to the Pacific Ocean for deep-sea exercises via the Bashi Channel separating Taiwan and the Philippines, Xinhua said.

The exercises and visit to James Shoal did not encroach on any islands where neighboring countries have any substantial presence and drew no immediate response from them, but took place in an area with a complicated patchwork of overlapping claims.

The maneuvers were an important, symbolic declaration of Chinese sovereignty intended to show that Beijing will not waver over its territorial claims despite pushback in the region, said Peking University international relations expert Zhu Feng. Militarily, it means little since the navy has visited a number of times before and has no intention of basing troops near the remote shoal, he said.

"These recent naval operations can be seen as a strong indication of Chinese resolve, but they're also a continuation of the existing Chinese stance," Zhu said.

The Spratlys and other South China Sea island groups are surrounded by rich fishing grounds and some of the world's busiest shipping lanes. China and Vietnam have also begun experimental drilling in the area in hopes of tapping a suspected wealth of oil and gas, further exacerbating frictions that date back decades and have from time to time flared into military action.

China battled Vietnam for control of territory in the region as recently as 1988, and clashes between its naval forces and fishermen from Vietnam and elsewhere are frequently reported.

In the latest incident, Vietnam accused the Chinese navy of setting fire to the cabin aboard a Vietnamese fishing boat last week off the disputed Paracel Islands north of the Spratlys. Hanoi said it filed a formal complaint with the Chinese embassy and is demanding compensation and punishment of the sailors involved.

Beijing responded indignantly on Tuesday, saying its sailors had merely fired flares to drive Vietnamese boats from an area where it said they were fishing illegally. The navy denied causing any damage to the Vietnamese boats.

China's increasingly assertive defense of its claims in the area has sparked a backlash from Vietnam, the Philippines and others. Those countries have turned to the region's traditional dominant power, the U.S., as a counterweight, adding momentum to Washington's renewed focus on security ties in the Asia-Pacific, a strategic pivot viewed by Beijing as part of an effort to encircle it and stymie its development.

Along with maintaining garrisons on territory it claims, China has stepped up patrols by both its navy and ships from civilian maritime agencies that were recently consolidated into a single department along the lines of the U.S. Coast Guard.

The naval task force taking part in the latest drills consists of the Jinggangshan, the destroyer Lanzhou, and the missile frigates Yulin and Hengshui, among China's most modern and capable naval ship, according to an online report by the official People's Daily newspaper.

The drills on and around Johnson Reef and other Chinese-garrisoned islands and outcroppings involved hovercraft, ship-born helicopters, amphibious tanks, and land-based fighters, bombers and early warning aircraft, it said. Photos accompanying the report showed hovercraft setting off from the Jinggangshan and troops in lifejackets storming a beach.

Korean border open despite NKorean hotline cut

SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — A day after shutting down a key military hotline, Pyongyang instead used indirect communications with Seoul to allow South Koreans to cross the heavily armed border and work at a factory complex that is the last major symbol of inter-Korean cooperation.

Business was operating normally at the Kaesong industrial complexin North Korea, despite Pyongyang's shutting down of the hotline usually used to arrange passage for workers and goods through the Demilitarized Zone. The military communication channel, which consists of six telephone, fax and reserve lines, was virtually the last remaining direct link between the rival Koreas, which do not have diplomatic relations.

South Korean officials say North Korea has shut down the hotline but verbally approved the crossing Thursday by telling South Koreans at a management office at the factory in North Korea. Those South Koreans then called officials in South Korea. Both governments prohibit direct contact with citizens on the other side, but Kaesong has separate telephone lines that allow South Korean managers there to communicate with people in South Korea.

Technically, the divided Korean Peninsula remains in a state of war. North Korea also halted communications in 2009, creating a cross-border shutdown that left hundreds of South Korean workers stranded in the North for several days, until the line was restored.

The hotline shutdown follows a torrent of bellicose rhetoric in recent weeks from North Korea, which is angry about annual South Korea-U.S. military drills and U.N. sanctions over its nuclear test last month. North Korea calls the drills rehearsal for an invasion; Seoul and Washington say the training is defensive in nature and that they have no intention of attacking.

North Korea's threats and provocations are seen as efforts to provoke the new government in Seoul, led by President Park Geun-hye, to change its policies toward Pyongyang. North Korea's moves at home to order troops into "combat readiness" are seen as ways to build domestic unity as young leader Kim Jong Un strengthens his military credentials.

North Korea previously cut Red Cross phone and fax hotlines with South Korea, and another communication channel with the U.S.-led U.N. command at the border between the Koreas. Three other telephone hotlines used only to exchange information about air traffic were still operating normally Thursday, according to South Korea's Air Traffic Center.

North Korea said there was no need for communication between the countries in a situation "where a war may break out at any moment."

In Washington, U.S. State Department spokesman Patrick Ventrell told reporters that North Korea's "latest threat to cut off communication links coupled with its provocative rhetoric is not constructive to ensuring peace and stability on the peninsula."

Although North Korea has vowed nuclear strikes on the U.S., analysts outside the country have seen no proof that North Korean scientists have yet mastered the technology needed to build a nuclear warhead small enough to mount on a missile.

Park so far has outlined a policy that looks to re-engage North Korea, stressing the need for greater trust with North Korea while saying Pyongyang will "pay the price" for any provocation. Last week she approved a shipment of anti-tuberculosis medicine to the North.

Aside from Kaesong, other rapprochement projects created during a previous era of detente, including the reunions of families separated by the Korean War and tours to a scenic North Korean mountain, have stopped amid tensions in recent years.

But the border was still open Thursday. About 160 South Koreans traveled to the Kaesong complex from the South, according to Seoul's Unification Ministry. The total number of South Koreans at Kaesong on Thursday was more than 1,000.

"Nothing good happens when (the Koreas) are in conflict. I just hope that both the North and the South will maintain a good relationship and show a more harmonious attitude," Kim Jong-in, one of the South Korean workers, told The Associated Press in Paju, which is near the border, on Thursday before departing for Kaesong.

Since 2004, the Kaesong factories have operated with South Korean money and know-how, with North Korean factory workers managed by South Koreans.

Using North Korea's cheap, efficient labor, the Kaesong complex has produced $470 million worth of goods in 2012. Inter-Korean trade, which includes a small amount of humanitarian aid sent to the North and components and raw materials sent to Kaesong complex to build finished products, amounted to nearly $2 billion in 2012, according to South Korea's Unification Ministry.

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Egypt locusts put neighboring Israel on high alert

Israel's Agriculture Ministry set up an emergency hotline Monday and is asking Israelis to be vigilant in reporting locust sightings to prevent an outbreak.

Swarms of locusts obscure the Giza pyramids near Cairo, in 2004. Swarms of pink locusts swept through Cairo on Wednesday that recalled the plague of biblical Egypt, flying high above tall towers and scaring pedestrians who stamped on them or ran for cover.
Aladin Abdel Naby/Reuters

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Bible comes to life as locusts swarm Israel

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Bible comes to life as locusts swarm Israel

Israeli Jews celebrating Passover will easily relate to their ancestors this year – the country has been swarmed by millions of locusts, one of the 10 plagues visited on the Egyptians.

Locusts have descended on Israel this week, just in time forPassover. As millions of Jews commemorate the story of thechildren of Israel’s exodus from Egypt, including the 10 plagues that afflicted Pharaoh and his people, millions of the crunchy buggers are creeping all over Israel’s southern deserts.

This is nothing like the eighth plague of biblical times, in whichlocusts covered “the whole face of the earth” in a kind of collective punishment for the Egyptians whose leader refused to let his Hebrew slaves go free.

But this year is the first time since 2005 that modern-day Israel has had to combat locusts, which can swarm so thickly that drivers can’t see beyond their windshield. Potato farmers bemoaned the detrimental effect of a previous wave of the grasshopper-like insects several weeks ago. The Israeli Ministry of Agriculture, which was on “locust alert,” has responded quickly to the latest wave with pesticides.

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But it’s not just Israel. Today the Palestinian Authority’s Ministry of Agriculture sprayed pesticides in Hebron, in the southern West Bank. And Egyptian farmers have suffered millions of dollars in damage after a swarm of about 30 million locusts hit Cairo earlier this month.

The most serious situation, however, appears to be in Sudan, where the United Nations Food & Agricultural Organization (FAO) head has warned that immature “hoppers” are lining up along a 1,000-kilometer (621-mile) stretch of the Nile and could pose a serious threat to Nile Valley crops in May.

OK, so locusts are not your average grasshopper. But still, how can they cause such massive damage?

Consider these arresting facts: They can eat their weight in crops every day; They can fly more than 80 miles a day – in swarms as dense as 200 million per square mile; And females can lay as many as 1,000 egg pods in roughly 10 square feet, according to a FAO fact sheet.

To put the threat in practical terms, 1 ton of locusts (just a fraction of your average swarm) can eat about as much food as 2,500 people can in a single day, says FAO.

The Israelis have sought to reverse the food chain this Passover, however, by grilling the kosher insects for a crunchy, high-protein delicacy. And they’re not alone. Locust recipes abound.

A Mexican version from “Man Eating Bugs: The Art and Science of Eating Insects,” by Peter Menzel and Faith D'Aluisio calls for roasting locust torsos and sprinkling them on homemade guacamole in a taco shell. Scrap that. Sprinkle and enjoy, the cookbook says.

B’tayavon, as the Israelis would say. Bon appetit.

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