President Xi Jinping had pledged not to place arms on the islands in the Spratly archipelago.
BEIJING—China has installed antiaircraft guns and other weapons on all seven of the artificial islands it has built in a disputed part of the South China Sea, according to a U.S. think tank’s analysis of recent satellite imagery. Late Wednesday, the Asia Maritime Transparency Initiative said China had installed the weapons despite President Xi Jinping’s pledge not to militarize the islands in the Spratly archipelago, where Beijing’s territorial claims are contested by several other governments. AMTI’s report, published on its website, comes after U.S. President-elect Donald Trump suggested this month he would challenge China on trade and the status of Taiwan, and accused Beijing of building a “massive military complex” in the South China Sea.
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