US-China tensions: why is Malaysia so quiet about the South China Sea?
Malaysia's South China Sea policy has come under the spotlight after a public rebuke of its foreign minister Hishammuddin Hussein by one of his predecessors Anifah Aman, and as Washington hardens its position against Beijing over the disputed waterway.
Anifah, who was foreign minister for nine years until the downfall of ex-leader Najib Razak's government in the May 2018 election, admonished Hishammuddin on Thursday for saying Chinese ships had not intruded into Malaysian waters for the past 100 days.
Satellite images and sightings clearly indicated otherwise, said Anifah and analysts.
"I am appalled by the [Foreign] Minister's statement. He is either in denial or ignorant of the fact. Worse, he is playing politics with Malaysia's maritime and strategic interests," said Anifah, a serving parliamentarian from Hishammuddin's party.
Hishammuddin took on his portfolio in March when the Perikatan Nasional coalition came to power following a political scandal that tore apart the Pakatan Harapan administration that won the May 2018 polls. He was previously the defence minister in Najib's government.
He said on Wednesday that in his first 100 days in office, "Chinese vessels have not been seen in our waters".
"So how did we manage this? This is between us and the Chinese leadership ... my stand is very clear, we will not compromise on our sovereignty," national news agency Bernama quoted him as telling a media conference in parliament.
Malaysia and Brunei are two of the four Southeast Asian states opposing Beijing's expansive claims in the South China Sea, through which US$3.4 trillion worth of international shipping trade passes every year. But unlike Vietnam and the Philippines, they have made few public statements on the issue, even as Beijing built artificial islands and sent coastguard and research vessels to the resource-rich area to strengthen its claims.
A Malaysian government report last week stated that incursions into Malaysia's exclusive economic zone by Chinese ships had taken place 89 times between 2016 and 2019.
Foreign Minister Hishammuddin responded to Anifah's criticism by saying he was referring to "intensive diplomatic efforts" to get Chinese Coast Guard and fishing militia to leave Malaysia's exclusive economic zone in May as the West Capella drillship, contracted by state energy firm Petronas, conducted oil and gas exploration activities.
"Our position on the South China Sea has not changed from [Anifah's] time," he said.
But Liew Chin Tong, a former deputy defence minister under the Pakatan Harapan, said Hishammuddin's statement was made probably with the intention of "sweeping the problems under the carpet".
"I would hope that he and the foreign ministry be candid instead," said Liew.
The previous administration had made clear in a 2019 Defence White Paper that Malaysia did not wish to choose sides and was concerned about US-China tensions, said Liew.
But in not taking sides, it was imperative for Malaysia to make its view clear and tell "both sides to refrain from great power rivalry at our doorstep", he added.
"I hope the Perikatan government will be candid and upfront with both the US and China, and do everything it could to dial down the temperature in [the South China Sea]," Liew said.
Malaysia in December last year submitted a "note verbale" " an unsigned but officially marked diplomatic communication issued in the third person " to the United Nations claiming an extended part of its continental shelf. It sparked a flurry of notes in response from China, the Philippines, Vietnam and Indonesia, though the latter is not a party to the dispute.
Last Sunday, Philippines Foreign Secretary Teodoro Locsin Jnr called for China to comply with the 2016 ruling of an arbitral tribunal that rejected Beijing's argument of historic rights over most of the South China Sea.
Beijing did not participate in the tribunal process and said it would not abide by the ruling.
The award was "non-negotiable", Locsin said, in the strongest statement the Philippines under China-friendly President Rodrigo Duterte has made on the ruling.
The next day, US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo announced a formal rejection of "most" of China's maritime claims in the South China Sea, saying the world would "not allow Beijing to treat the South China Sea as its maritime empire". Beijing decried the move, saying Washington was damaging regional peace and stability with its remarks.
US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo. Photo: AFP alt=US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo. Photo: AFP
Vietnam, which has publicly chided China on the issue, welcomed the US statement.
Greg Poling, director of the Asia Maritime Transparency Initiative at the Washington-based Centre for Strategic and International Studies, said a Chinese Coast Guard ship had regularly patrolled the Luconia Shoals, in waters off the Malaysian coast, every day since March.
Anifah, the former foreign minister, said that in April a flotilla of Chinese enforcement vessels was sighted accompanying a Chinese survey vessel within Malaysia's maritime areas and he was "reliably informed" that Chinese Coast Guard vessels were sighted in the vicinity of Beting Patinggi Ali (the Malay name for Luconia Shoals) from May to this month.
Zachary Abuza, who specialises in Southeast Asian security studies at the Washington-based National War College, said that while last year's defence white paper identified maritime security as a primary concern, it did not name China as a cause of worry and Malaysia continued to purchase littoral mission ships " generally considered warships " from its largest trading partner.
"The government is completely downplaying any Chinese assertiveness. They need the investment, trade, and now Covid-19 assistance," said Abuza.
But Shahriman Lockman, senior analyst at the Institute of Strategic and International Studies (ISIS), said Malaysia did not recognise China's expansive claims in the South China Sea and maintained its sovereign rights in its exclusive economic zone in the area.
He said Malaysia had resisted pressure to withdraw the West Capella drillship and had sent the note verbale to the UN Commission on the Limits of the Continental Shelf.
"Malaysia is rhetorically quiet, but it does stubbornly persist in its oil and gas activities and its lawfare in the South China Sea," said Shahriman.
"China is crucial to Malaysia's economic future and will probably continue to grow as a military power. So the policy needs to be tempered by the reality of China. Policy therefore becomes a series of anguished calculations and adjustments," he said.
Vietnam's history of contesting China's claims was "more bloody than Malaysia's", he said, and this had resulted in their approach being "more pointed".
"Malaysia's policy is to precisely avoid escalating the situation that would result in such bloody encounters. And so it has adopted a mix of quiet diplomacy while actively shadowing China's vessels in the South China Sea," said Shahriman.
US planes accompany the guided-missile destroyer USS Ralph Johnson on an exercise in the South China Sea. Photo: EPA alt=US planes accompany the guided-missile destroyer USS Ralph Johnson on an exercise in the South China Sea. Photo: EPA
Wang Yiwei, director of the Institute for International Affairs at Renmin University of China in Beijing, said Malaysia was one of the most active Asean (Association of Southeast Asian Nations) states in cooperating with China, citing industrial park projects in the state of Kuantan and the Chinese province of Guangxi as an example.
"[Malaysia's] economic interests with China are very strong. Its steel industry and future industrialisation are very much tied to China," Wang said.
He said the sultanate of Brunei also adopted a low profile in the dispute and tended to express its views only after larger countries in the bloc had done so.
Brunei and China have a joint petrochemical venture that is the sultanate's largest project involving foreign investment.
Wang said although Brunei "may have some territorial differences with China", the sultanate chose not to dwell on them. "And moreover, the recent drop in oil prices also has a huge impact on Brunei," Wang said.
Shahriman of ISIS said there had been much speculation about the long-term economic future of Brunei, especially when its oil and gas reserves were running low and prices were depressed. "This has probably led Brunei's policymakers to see little choice but to remain quiescent about its dispute with China," said Shahriman.
Some observers, however, have noted that Australia and the US have begun to deploy their maritime patrol aircraft, the Boeing P-8 Poseidon, with greater regularity in Brunei than in the past.
"This could suggest that Brunei is becoming more anxious about China's activities in its EEZ and is looking towards facilitating some kind of pushback against China," said Shahriman.
Abuza said the US, whose military vessels have been patrolling the South China Sea as part of freedom of navigation operations, was unlikely to ramp up these patrols after Pompeo's statement as "there are only so many ships in the US Navy".
Washington's support for the tribunal ruling, while a positive step, was "simply too little and too late", given that it came four years after the fact. In the meantime, the administration of US President Donald Trump had weakened its alliances, cast doubt on the country's commitment to treaty obligations, and shown contempt for international laws and norms, he said.
"I think that it's very telling that the states that most benefit from this statement in Southeast Asia have released very tepid responses to it. No country wants to be pulled into a US-China stand-off, which may very well just be an election ploy," he said, referring to the US presidential election in November.
Shahriman said there was no way to escape the US-China rivalry, no matter how hard "regional countries want to wish it away". In Malaysia's case, both the US and China were critical to its economic prosperity and security, he said.
This article originally appeared on the South China Morning Post (SCMP).
Copyright (c) 2020. South China Morning Post Publishers Ltd. All rights reserved.
