Xi Jinping visits Vietnam amid territorial disputes over the South China Sea
President Xi Jinping heads to Hanoi on Thursday for a visit that has drawn the ire of Vietnamese nationalists at a time of bubbling conflict over disputed territory in the South China Sea.
The communist neighbours have long celebrated their political and economic ties, but in recent years tensions have flared in a decades-old feud over island chains in the contested waters.
Ahead of Xi’s visit, the first by a Chinese president to Vietnam in 10 years, anti-China activists have staged small but rare protests in the heart of the Vietnamese capital and southern Ho Chi Minh City.
“Protesting Xi Jinping’s visit”, said one of the banners held aloft by some dozen demonstrators on Tuesday as they marched through downtown Hanoi, flanked but not arrested by at least triple the number of police.
Rallies are rare in authoritarian Vietnam, but the ruling regime has increasingly tolerated low levels of dissent against its main ally China.