Was China looking to take advantage of Russia's setbacks, under international sanctions and embroiled in its war in Ukraine, to nibble away a few dozen square kilometers? On Monday, August 28, the Ministry of Natural Resources published the 2023 edition of the "National Map of China," an official document that has become the reference regarding "national sovereignty." In the far northeast of the country, China seems to have made Bolshoi Ussuriysky Island its own.

Located at the confluence of the Amur and Ussuri rivers, this island of around 300 square kilometers has long been a subject of dispute between the two countries. In 1929, Russia occupied the island and prohibited China from navigating that part of the Amur River, which Beijing has always contested. In 2004, however, the two countries reached a compromise: The western part of the island went to China, which could also navigate on the Amur River, but in return, Beijing accepted that the eastern part would go to Russia.

Although the map published on the Ministry's website is not precise enough to show the border clearly, the Ministry has defined its "scope": "The confluence of the Heilongjiang [Chinese name for the Amur] and Ussuri rivers is drawn to the east," it states. This confluence is theoretically located in Russian territory. Moreover, the Chinese search engine Baidu Maps does not indicate the course of the border in the middle of the island, but on the eastern part of the island, it has explicitly written "Fuyuan Delta" in Chinese, using the name of the Chinese district to which the western part of the island is administratively attached. When questioned by Le Monde, the Ministry of Natural Resources did not respond. Russia does not appear to have reacted.

By contrast, several other countries bordering China have officially protested against the publication of this map: India, Malaysia, Vietnam and the Philippines, as well as Taiwan, which, according to this document, is an integral part of the People's Republic of China.

India contested the inclusion of the state of Arunachal Pradesh and the Aksai Chin plateau in the document. In April, China had already given Chinese names to a dozen sites in Arunachal Pradesh, one of India's 28 states. "Such initiatives by the Chinese side only complicate the resolution of the border issue," commented a spokesperson for the Indian Ministry of External Affairs. Perhaps it is because of this dispute that Chinese President Xi Jinping has decided not to attend the G20 meeting in New Delhi on September 9 and 10, leaving it to his premier, Li Qiang, to represent China.

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