China Research Center

- Overview

The China Research Center promotes understanding of Greater China based on in-depth research and experience. Center Associates (freelance) are experts in Greater China's history, contemporary politics, science, technology, economics, business environment, language, culture and media, working to build bridges between EITA and Mainland China, Taiwan, Macau and Hong Kong.

- China's Massive Belt and Road Initiative

China's Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), sometimes called the New Silk Road, is one of the most ambitious infrastructure projects ever undertaken. A series of development and investment initiatives launched by President Xi Jinping in 2013 initially aimed to connect East Asia and Europe through physical infrastructure. In the decade since, the program has expanded to Africa, Oceania and Latin America, significantly expanding China's economic and political influence. 

Some analysts see the project as a troubling extension of China's rising power, and opposition has grown in some countries as the cost of many projects has soared. At the same time, the U.S. shares some Asian countries' concerns that the Belt and Road Initiative could become a Trojan horse for China-led regional development and military expansion

[South China Sea Map - Nations Online]

- The 9-Dash Line (or The 11-Dash Line), The South China Sea 

The nine-dash line, also known as the eleven-dash line in Taiwan, is a set of line segments on various maps claimed by the People's Republic of China (PRC, "Mainland China") and the Republic of China. 

The disputed areas include the Paracel Islands, the Spratly Islands, Dongsha Island and Verwick Shoal, Macclesfield Shoal, and Scarborough Shoal. Some places have been reclaimed by the People's Republic of China, the Republic of China, and Vietnam. 

The People’s Daily of the People’s Republic of China uses a dotted line or the South China Sea dotted line, and the government of the Republic of China uses an eleven-dash line . ‘eleven-dash line’). 

The government of the Republic of China first published a 1946 map on December 1, 1947, showing a U-shaped eleven-dash line. 

In 1952, as relations with North Vietnam warmed, Mao Zedong of the People's Republic of China decided to remove two dashes in the Gulf of Tonkin. However, the ROC government still uses the eleven-dash line. 

In 2013, some people were surprised by the tenth dash east of Taiwan, but it was on the map of the People's Republic of China as early as 1984. The government of the People's Republic of China does not always use this line when asserting its sovereignty. It doesn't clarify how the dashes are connected and which features are specifically included or excluded. 

On July 12, 2016, an arbitral tribunal established under the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea concluded that China’s historic claims to the high seas would have no legal effect if they exceeded the provisions of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea. 

One of the arguments is that China does not exercise exclusive control over these waters and resources. However, the Tribunal cannot rule on issues of territorial sovereignty. Governments of more than two dozen countries have called for the ruling to be respected. It has been rejected by eight governments, including the People's Republic of China and the Republic of China.

[More to come ...]