MARIT STINUS-CABUGON
The year 2017 was “a constructive year for Chinese base building” in the South China Sea, according to Washington D.C.-based Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS). On December 14, CSIS reported that China had completed 29 hectares (290,000 square meters) of “new real estate” on three reefs in the Spratly archipelago and three islands in the Paracels. On December 24, the Chinese newspaper Global Times confirmed both the figure and the fact that China had “accelerated construction and enhanced its military presence on South China Sea Islands and shoals over the past year as territorial tensions with neighboring countries are subsiding.”