China's new foreign shipping law is the next step towards creating an exclusion zone in the contested waterway

China enacted a new maritime law on September 1 requiring multiple classes of foreign vessels traversing Beijing-claimed waters to provide detailed information to state authorities and take aboard Chinese pilots. Analysts say the legal requirements are clearly aimed at the United States and its allies’ military presence in disputed waterways.

The US Pentagon has called the new law a “serious threat” and violation of international law. It is unclear how aggressively and how widely the new law will be enforced, and over how wide of a geography, or indeed If China’s “territorial waters” will be interpreted to include nearly all of the hotly contested South China Sea.

Asia Times’ correspondent Richard Javad Heydarianshared his insights on China’s multi-phased strategy to dominate the South China Sea with the Southeast Asia Insider.

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