CCG safeguards China's sovereignty and maritime rights

The China Coast Guard has taken firm measures in accordance with laws and regulations to prevent and curb foreign infringement and provocations, effectively safeguarding China's sovereignty and maritime rights and interests, the head of the CCG said in an interview on Friday.

Zhang Jianming, director general of the CCG, told the press that since the implementation of the Coast Guard Law on Feb 1, 2021, the CCG has deployed vessels on about 550,000 occasions and aircraft on 6,000 occasions to carry out missions protecting China's maritime rights.

Over the past five years, the CCG has conducted 134 patrols in the territorial waters of the Diaoyu Islands, with 357 days of patrols in 2025 alone, Zhang said.

Regular rights protection patrols have been carried out in the East China Sea, South China Sea, and Yellow Sea, he added, along with law-enforcement control in the territorial waters of China's Huangyan Island and adjacent areas.

Regarding law-enforcement patrols in the waters surrounding the island of Taiwan and its neighboring islands, Zhang said the CCG has established a new framework for managing the Taiwan Strait in accordance with the one-China principle and the law.

"Over the past five years, the CCG has continued to innovate its operational strategies, optimize control mechanisms, and strengthen capacity building," Zhang said, noting that the CCG has been able to detect foreign infringement activities in a timely manner and respond rapidly and effectively.

He also said that the CCG has achieved breakthroughs in integrated sea-air patrols around the Diaoyu Islands, helping to shape a new posture for maritime rights protection.

Liu Dejun, spokesman for the CCG, said the CCG conducts law-enforcement patrols in the territorial waters of Huangyan Island and adjacent areas in accordance with both domestic and international laws.

In addition to issuing warnings to and expelling foreign vessels and aircraft engaged in illegal infringement and disruptive activities, the CCG also provides assistance to vessels in distress in the surrounding waters, Liu said.

Last week, the CCG successfully rescued 17 Filipino crew members in the waters to the northwest of Huangyan Island and transferred them to the Philippine Coast Guard, which Liu said fully demonstrated China's image as a responsible major country.

He also highlighted the CCG's efforts to protect the surrounding ecosystem following the establishment of the Huangyan Island National Nature Reserve, where the ecosystem remains healthy and stable, with rich biodiversity.

"The CCG will continue to conduct law-enforcement patrols in the territorial waters of Huangyan Island and adjacent areas, exercise lawful control over vessels engaged in infringement and disruptive activities, maintain good order and the ecological environment in relevant waters, and resolutely safeguard national territorial sovereignty, security, and maritime rights and interests," Liu said.