China’s construction work on reefs in the South China Sea is “unwarranted provocation,” Malaysia’s military chief said on Sunday in a rare public comment about the spat from a country that has its own claims in the heavily disputed waters. China’s relations with several Southeast Asian countries, especially the Philippines and Vietnam who also have competing claims in the South China Sea, have been strained by Beijing’s increasingly assertive tone in an area through which $5 trillion in ship-borne trade passes annually. Beijing's move last year to step up the creation of artificial islands, which it says are mostly for civilian purposes, has also drawn strong criticism from Washington and its Pacific allies Australia, Japan, the Philippines and Vietnam.

Malaysia condemns Chinese ‘islands’ (2015, October 19). Philippine Daily Inquirer, pp. A1, A4.