What you need to know about south china sea

The South China sea is a part of the Pacific ocean.

China, Taiwan, the Philippines, Malaysia, Brunei, Indonesia, Singapore, and Vietnam all have their borders shared with the sea. The sea is very important strategically as one third of International Trade passes through it carrying over $3 trillion in trade each year.

All the border countries are involved in one or more disputes. Many countries including the US, want South China sea to remain International waters 

To promote this, several countries conduct "freedom of navigation" operations there. There are many disputes over the sea. 

More than half the tonnage of the world's crude oil transported by sea passes through the South China Sea. This traffic is three times greater than that passing through the Suez Canal and five times more than the Panama Canal.

2011 agreement

In 2011, Chuna, Brunei, Malaysia, the Philippines and Vietnam agreed to guidelines which would help resolve the dispute.

• China has also objected India for entering into the South China sea. India was accused of getting INS Airavat which was on a friendly visit to Vietnam, 45 nautical miles into the South China sea from the Vietnamese coast. 

• The coast guard of Philippines machine gunned a Taiwanese fisherman to death in May 2013. 

• In the spring of 2014, China and Vietnam clashed again over China's Haiyang Shiyou oil rig in Vietnam's Exclusive economic zone. The incident left seventeen Vietnamese injured and damaged both China's and Vietnam's ships.

In the current scenario, it is very important for leaders of the states to setup a more effective mechanism in the South China sea for maintaining peace and stability.