Vietnam PM texts nation amid anti-China riots

Vietnam's prime minister sent a text message to millions of citizens urging them to act in defense of the country's sovereignty following China's deployment of on oil rig in disputed waters, but said that "bad elements" shouldn't be allowed to engage in violence.

The message, sent late Thursday and into Friday to subscribers via major state-owned cellphone operators, didn't directly condemn the riots that have broken out this week following China's decision to deploy the rig off the coast of central Vietnam on May 1. Vietnamese patrol ships sent to disrupt the rig are currently locked in a tense standoff with Chinese ships guarding it.

"The prime minister requests and calls on every Vietnamese to boost their patriotism to defend the fatherland's sacred sovereignty with actions in line with the law," the text message read. "Bad elements should not be allowed to instigate extremist actions that harm the interests and image of the country."

Anti-China protests that started peacefully this week have ended in violence and vandalism, with 400 factories suspected of having links with China destroyed or damaged by mobs. One Chinese worker was killed and scores more injured at a Taiwanese steel mill that was overrun by a 1,000-strong crowd.

There were no reports of any new violence or protests on Friday.

It is the worst breakdown in ties between China and Vietnam since the two Communist neighbors fought a brief but bloody border war in 1979.

Neither China nor Vietnam has shown any sign of compromise.

Reporters and television stations have been permitted to cover the peaceful protests, something highly unusual and a clear sign of state sanction. But the violence and vandalism have been subject to a media blackout.

Vietnam's authoritarian leaders typically clamp down on public protests but have allowed them this time. Preventing people from demonstrating would have given fuel to domestic critics of the government who already accuse it of being soft on Beijing.

But violence that harms foreign investment and risks spinning out of control is unlikely to fit into this strategy, and the government will attempt to ensure that it doesn't break out again, most analysts say.

Vietnam believes it has international opinion on its side, and took a boatload of foreign journalists this week to waters close to the rig to ensure maximum media coverage. Beijing, which insists it has done nothing wrong and says it won't withdraw the rig, reacted angrily.

"It is clear that the aim of the Vietnamese side is to escalate the situation and create tension, or in other words, to generate a media hype and 'put up a show' in front of the international audience," the director general of the Foreign Ministry's Department of Ocean and Boundary Affairs, Ouyang Yujing, said in Beijing.

A spokesman at the Chinese Embassy in Washington, D.C., said in an emailed comment to Al Jazeera that amid heightening tensions with Hanoi, "China has no choice but to step up safety and security on the site [of the oil rig] and take necessary measures in reaction to Vietnam's ramming and harassing activities." 

Beijing will continue to urge Hanoi to pursue diplomatic alternatives, the spokesman added. 

China and Vietnam have tussled for years over competing territorial claims, as have the Philippines and China. But Beijing's desire for oil and gas, and its growing economic and military might, have seen it take an increasingly assertive stance to its claims in the sea, triggering increased tensions and incidents between it and claimant states.

The renewed tensions in the South China Sea underscore one of the biggest challenges in Asia facing President Barack Obama, who is under pressure by America's allies to accelerate a "pivot" of military assets to the region to counter China's rising influence.

The crisis has erupted after a week-long visit to Asia by Obama in late April in which he pledged that Washington would live up to its obligation to defend its allies in the region.

China has said Obama's strategic shift toward Asia had encouraged countries such as Vietnam, Japan and the Philippines to make trouble with Beijing. Washington insists its Asia-Pacific re-engagement is not meant to contain China's rise but that Beijing must conduct itself according to international norms.

"We're concerned that China has learned the wrong lessons from Russia and Ukraine and has decided that unilateral assertion is the way to advance China's interests," a senior U.S. official said.

Russia's annexation of Ukraine's Crimea peninsula — and perceptions of limited U.S. options to get Moscow to back down — have heightened unease in parts of Asia over whether Beijing will be emboldened to use force to pursue its territorial claims in the East and South China Seas.

The Philippines, one of Washington's closest allies in Asia, has said China is reclaiming land on a reef in the oil rich South China Sea that both countries claim, and is building what appears to be an airstrip on it. It has offered the United States the use of an underdeveloped naval base on a nearby island to ensure U.S. warships can enter the vicinity.

Al Jazeera and wire services. Massoud Hayoun contributed to this report.