Protestors hold banners during a protest in the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Park in Hiroshima, Japan, May 27, 2016. Dozens of Japanese citizens gathered in Hiroshima on Friday, protesting US President Barack Obama's visit to Hiroshima. Photo: Xinhua

 
China on Friday said it was strongly dissatisfied with a statement by G7 members that agreed on the need to send a strong message on maritime claims.

"China is strongly dissatisfied with what Japan and the G7 have done," Hua Chunying, spokeswoman for China's Ministry of Foreign Affairs, told a daily briefing on Friday in Beijing, urging G7 members to avoid irresponsible remarks and instead take actions beneficial to regional peace and stability.

Hua called on G7 members to be objective and fair and abide by their promise of not taking sides on territorial disputes.

"We are concerned about the situation in the East and South China Seas, and emphasize the fundamental importance of peaceful management and settlement of disputes," G7 leaders said in their declaration at the close of an annual summit on Friday, AFP reported.

The G7, comprised of the US, Japan, Britain, France, Germany, Italy and Canada, said settlement of disputes should be "peaceful" and "freedom of navigation and overflight" should be respected.

Though no individual countries were mentioned, the declaration appeared to be aimed at China.

Stronger tone

"Compared with the foreign ministry's response to G7 leaders' declaration in 2015 in Germany, its language this time indicates much stronger warning to the bloc after the continuous US provocation in the waters during the period," Liu Feng, an expert in Chinese maritime issues, told the Global Times on Friday. 

"The remarks of the G7 fall far short of the facts and international justice," Hong Lei, a spokesman for China's foreign ministry, was quoted by the Xinhua News Agency as saying in June 2015.

The US military has conducted several "freedom of navigation" operations, in which planes or ships pass within a 12 nautical mile buffer around the Chinese installations in the South China Sea. The latest was a "routine flight" of EP-3 Aries aircraft in international airspace, which was intercepted by two Chinese J-11 fighters.

"The strong reaction from China also results from Japan's deliberate attempt to bring the South China Sea issue to a multilateral platform while China hopes to avoid discussion with countries outside the region," Chen Xiangmiao, a research fellow at the National Institute for the South China Sea, told the Global Times on Friday.

Increased tensions

"As the G7 host, Japan is hyping up the South China Sea issue and fanning the flame of tensions," Hua said, adding that such action was not beneficial to stability in the South China Sea and does not accord with the G7's position as a platform for managing the developed economies.

Japan has tried to pressure China by internationalizing the issue ahead of the ruling made by an international tribunal in The Hague over an arbitration case against China, Chen noted.

The G7 leaders also stressed that judicial means "including arbitration" should be utilized, according to AFP.

Experts agreed that China's fierce response to the 2016 declaration also sent a warning to the European countries that maintain close relationship with China in economic and trade cooperation.

Although the European countries, which are completely irrelevant to the waters, are aware that freedom of navigation and overflight in the South China Sea have never been eroded, they are coerced by their ally, the US, to voice concerns on the issue, Chen said.

China firmly maintains the freedom of navigation and overflight in the South China Sea, but the navigational freedom of commercial vessels is not the same as the willful trespassing of warships, Hua said.

She added that China opposed the smear campaign by some countries in the name of "navigation freedom."

Urgent priorities

Also at the summit, G7 leaders said on Friday that pumping up the world economy is an "urgent priority." G7 industrial powers cautioned that the worldwide economy was patchy and faced unwelcome headwinds, but disputes erupted over how bad things actually are and the best course of action, AFP reported.

On the refugee crisis gripping Europe, they called for beefed-up efforts to tackle the root causes of mass migration, a problem that the whole world must deal with.

But leaders were unequivocal on their attitude to one of the risks facing the global economy, and came out firmly against the prospect of a so-called Brexit.

Agencies contributed to this story