China's ambassador to the United States Cui Tiankai blames the US side for escalating the situation in the South China Sea.
Cui Tiankai made the remark during a recent interview with the Wall Street Journal.
"The United States sent military reconnaissance planes to the region with reporters on board, which was clearly an attempt to provoke and escalate the situation. And the U.S. is also making a lot of statements, making false accusation against China and taking side in the territorial disputes in the region. That will really make the situation in the region less stable."
The ambassador's remark comes as the United States says it will continue surveillance operations in the South China Sea, while saying that China's construction in the region harms regional peace.
Cui Tiankai said China is more concerned than any countries about the stability in the region, as China has a huge volume of imports and exports going through the region.
"So stability will very much serve our interest, and I believe it will serve the interests of everybody else, unless someone has a different agenda. If somebody really wants to see escalation of the tensions in the region, then that could made as excuses as advancing their military deployment, for setting up cold-war type alliances there."
For more on the recent heating-up of territorial disputes in the South China Sea, CRI's Liu Kun earlier spoke to Su Hao, professor and director of the Center for Strategic and Peace Studies at China Foreign Affairs University.
