Vice President Kamala Harris yesterday said the US would find new ways to “raise the pressure on Beijing”, accusing China of bullying in hotly disputed Asian waters for the second time in two days.
Harris made the comments as she began a visit to Vietnam to stress US commitment to Asia, a trip critics have slammed as tone-deaf given the parallels with the superpower’s evacuations from Saigon and Kabul.
During a meeting with Vietnam President Nguyen Xuan Phuc, Harris said the US would continue to challenge Beijing’s “bullying and excessive maritime claims” in the South China Sea.
“We need to find ways to pressure and raise the pressure, frankly, on Beijing to abide by the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea,” she added.
During the Singapore leg of her regional trip on Tuesday, Harris also accused China of intimidation in the resource-rich waterway.
China hit back at the accusations through its state media yesterday, accusing the US of hypocrisy in attempting to “coerce and intimidate” countries in the region in its “scheme to contain China”.
Harris’ arrival in Vietnam was delayed due to what US officials called an “anomalous health incident” in Hanoi, an apparent reference to the so-called “Havana syndrome” which has afflicted US diplomats in several countries including China and Russia.
It is not clear what causes the syndrome, leading to unproven allegations that Russians or others used high-intensity electronic devices to physically harm US diplomats.
The Vietnam leg of the Asian tour has sparked criticism after the chaotic evacuation of Kabul prompted comparisons with the trauma of 1975 Saigon, when US helicopters ferried final evacuees from the embassy roof in the last days of the Vietnam War.
Harris is steering clear of both Saigon — now Ho Chi Minh City — and the historical parallels, instead emphasising Washington’s commitment to the region as she opened a branch of the US Centers for Disease Control (CDC) in Hanoi.
The launch was a symbol of the US’s “enduring relationship with Vietnam and Southeast Asia”, she told President Phuc.
Harris yesterday said a donation of 1mn Pfizer vaccines would begin arriving in Vietnam in the next 24 hours from the US — which has already sent 5mn doses to the country.
She later visited late US senator John McCain’s memorial during a downpour in the capital, laying flowers at the site where his plane was shot down by the North Vietnamese on the third anniversary of his death.
