China-North Korea Spat Unlikely to Create Major Rift
As maritime tensions with neighbors including Japan, Vietnam and the Philippines continue to simmer, China has a fresh grievance with a somewhat unexpected antagonist: North Korea. On May 8, the isolated authoritarian regime detained 28 Chinese fishermen in the Yellow Sea and demanded payments of as much as $63,000 for each of the three vessels held. On Monday, the three boats returned to the Chinese port city of Dalian with no apparent payment of ransom. But the fishermen’s lengthy detention and stories of abuse that have emerged after their release have fueled anger in China and a sense that North Korea doesn’t respect its only major ally. “People are really upset. This didn’t show North Korean friendship toward China,” says Yan Xuetong, dean of the Institute of Modern International Relations at Tsinghua University in Beijing. “They kept them for too long and didn’t return them as quickly as possible.”
The fishermen were held for 13 days. The captains of their three boats were pressed to sign documents in Korean that indicated they had sailed into North Korean waters, which they argue was incorrect, according to Chinese press reports. Upon release, the fishermen discovered that their boats had largely been stripped of cash, valuable electronics and even toiletries, Wang Lijie, captain of one of the boats, told the 21st Century Business Herald, a Chinese newspaper. Many of them had their clothes taken as well, returning to port in their underwear. Wang said they had been deprived of sufficient food and some of them had been beaten by their captors, who appeared to be members of the North Korean military. Wang told the newspaper that a cook who was angered by the North Koreans using a Chinese flag to cart off a radar was later beaten by three soldiers who tore open his lip. The fishermen underwent a medical check upon their release; three reported headaches and one, a stomachache, the state-run Xinhua news service reported, but no serious injuries.