Vietnam slams China postal stamps over island dispute

By Bennett Murray

HANOI (AA) - Vietnam has demanded China withdraw a new series of postal stamps that “seriously violate Vietnam’s sovereignty” in the South China Sea.

The five contentious stamps, which were issued in October, have come under fire for depicting Chinese-built lighthouses in the hotly contested Spratly archipelago, reported the Tuoi Tre newspaper Wednesday.

A statement posted Tuesday on Vietnam’s Ministry of Information and Communications’ website demanded the immediate removal of the stamps from circulation.

“The release of the stamps seriously violated Vietnam's sovereignty over the Spratly islands,” read the statement.

Both China and Vietnam claim the chain of small islands on historical grounds in an escalating conflict over wider maritime sovereignty disputes in the South China Sea.

Vietnam maintains that China is building up a military presence on the Spratlys, where both countries have a presence, as well as on the neighboring Paracel islands, which China seized from Vietnam entirely in 1974.

The Philippines, Malaysia and Taiwan also maintain claims in the Spratly chain.

China claims most of the South China Sea, which contains some of the world’s busiest shipping lanes and potentially lucrative deposits of fossil fuels, as integral parts of their maritime territory.

While ownership of the individual islands remain unresolved under international law, a July international arbitration court ruling in The Hague stated that there was no “legal basis” for China to claim historic rights in the waters.