海角大神

South Korea reproached claims by China that its decision to deploy a missile defense system on the Korean peninsula will destabilize the region, as tensions between the Asian powers have risen over the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) unit.

President Park Geun-hye of South Korea said Sunday that the blame Beijing assigned to it in an editorial in the Chinese-run People鈥檚 Daily on Wednesday was 鈥渙ut of place.鈥� The statement from Ms. Park鈥檚 office instead put the onus on Beijing, which she said has not curbed North Korea enough.

"Rather than taking issue with our purely defensive action, China should raise issue in a stronger manner with North Korea which is breaking peace and stability on the Korean peninsula and Northeast by conducting four nuclear tests and, just this year, launching more than 10 ballistic missiles," said Kim Sung-woo, the senior press secretary, in the statement. 聽

The blame game South Korea and China have been ensnared in this month shows the rising tensions between the two countries in the face of the growing number of weapons tests that North Korea has been conducting in the region. Yet, the dispute between Seoul and Beijing also represents Beijing鈥檚 anger that Seoul, instead of looking to China, turned to its long-time military ally, the United States, for security. 聽

THAAD is a US-developed system that detects incoming missiles and intercepts them at high altitudes.

鈥淭hink of it as the outer layer in a multi-layered defense system designed to protect South Korea 鈥� and the 28,500 U.S. military personnel stationed there 鈥� from North Korean missile attacks,鈥� writes Col. Clint Hinote of the US Air Force in a post for the Council on Foreign Relations.

But China objected to the system out of fear that its powerful radar will enable the US, South Korea, and Japan to use it against the Chinese. Though there had been discussions for years of a THAAD unit on the peninsula, South Korea had remained hesitant to accept a US offer to deploy the unit because of China鈥檚 concerns.

Over that same period, the two Asian countries developed a regional friendship, according to Jane Perlez of The New York Times.

But increased North Korean aggression, including four nuclear tests, worried South Korea. During North Korea's fourth nuclear test in January, in which the country said it tested a hydrogen bomb, Park couldn鈥檛 reach Xi by telephone.聽According to South Korean officials, Park became convinced China could not rein in North Korea鈥檚 nuclear ambitions, South Korean officials said.

So, Park turned to the US for protection. South Korea agreed in July to allow the US military to deploy THAAD there by 2017, immediately drawing criticism from China.聽

Since then, North Korea has also conducted more weapons tests in the region. On Wednesday, it fired its first missile ever to land in Japanese waters. The test missile landed 600 kilometers (nearly 400 miles) from Japan.

Meanwhile, China has laid the blame on South Korea, most recently in an editorial in the state-run People鈥檚 Daily.

鈥淭he joint decision of Seoul and Washington in early July to deploy the system on the Korean Peninsula breaks the strategic balance in Northeast Asia, threatening if not dooming regional peace and stability with a possible onset of a new Cold War,鈥� it reads. 鈥淲hat South Korea truly needs to ensure its national security is a friendly neighborhood rather than a US Terminal High Altitude Air Defense (THAAD) system at the cost of the interests of surrounding countries such as China.鈥�

In addition to its rebuke of the editorial, South Korea has reversed past assurances it made to Beijing about THAAD. South Korea originally told China it would not share any radar information with Japan. But South Korea reversed that promise following the North Korean missile that landed in Japanese water, saying it was considering sharing the information under a trilateral agreement with Japan and the US, according to UPI. 聽

Even within South Korea, there is opposition to the deployment of THAAD, 海角大神 reports.

THAAD is not the only current point of conflict between China and the US. As the Monitor reported, the two have also clashed over Chinese territorial claims in the South China Sea and competition on global markets.