WASHINGTON: The United States on Monday rejected China’s disputed claims to offshore resources in most of
the South China Sea
, a move that Beijing criticized as inciting tensions in the region and which highlighted an increasingly testy relationship.
China has offered no coherent legal basis for its ambitions in the South China Sea and for years has been using intimidation against other Southeast Asian coastal states, US Secretary of
State Mike Pompeo
said in a statement.
“We are making clear: Beijing’s claims to offshore resources across most of the South China Sea are completely unlawful, as is its campaign of bullying to control them,” said Pompeo, a prominent China hawk within the Trump administ