China on Monday urged the US, Japan and Australia to refrain from any activities that may affect regional stability or from using their alliance to interfere in territorial disputes, said foreign ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying.

Hua made the comments in response to a joint statement of the fifth trilateral strategic dialogue issued on Friday by US State Secretary John Kerry, Australia's Foreign Minister Julie Bishop and Japan's Foreign Minister Fumio Kishida, which encompasses issues related to the East China Sea and South China Sea.

The three ministers opposed any coercive or unilateral actions that might break the status quo in the East China Sea, according to the joint statement issued on the sidelines of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) meeting in Bali of Indonesia.

"The alliance between the US, Japan and Australia should not be used as an excuse to interfere in disputes over territorial sovereignty, otherwise it will only complicate the situation and hurt the interests of the relevant parties," said Hua.

Tensions had been increasing between China and Japan since the Japanese administration announced the "nationalization" of the Diaoyu Islands in the East China Sea in September 2012.

Although the US publicly states that it does not take sides in sovereignty issues, it also opposes any unilateral actions to change the "administration status" of the Diaoyu Islands under the Treaty of Mutual Cooperation and Security between the US and Japan, which is consistent with the position shown in the latest joint statement, Meng Xiangqing, a security strategist at the People's Liberation Army University of National Defense, told the Global Times.

"This is actually a warning to China.  The three countries are working together to put pressure on China, show their strength, and also give the international community the impression that their stances are the same," Meng added.

The joint statement also called for "navigation freedom" and implementation of international protocols while pursuing claims in the South China Sea, where China and some ASEAN (Association of Southeast Asian Nations) countries, including the Philippines and Vietnam, are involved in sovereignty disputes.

Separately, Japanese Foreign Minister Fumio Kishida also raised issues related to navigation freedom and maritime safety on Saturday during an APEC breakfast meeting for foreign ministers.

Li Baodong, China's vice foreign minister, on Sunday responded by saying that APEC is an economic and trade cooperation forum, and for years has maintained its tradition of not introducing political or controversial issues.

Sovereignty disputes in the South China Sea have existed among other countries and China for a long time, but had never posed problems to the region's navigation freedom, said Meng.

The so-called navigation freedom issue was first raised by the US as a pretext for intervening in the disputes in the South China Sea, hoping to "unite" countries which have sovereignty disputes with China to work against it, added Meng.