The uninhabited islands at the centre of an escalating territorial row between Tokyo and Beijing may sit on top of a rich oil reserve – or may be little more than a bunch of rocks.
Decades-long speculation about the value of the islands, known in Japan as Senkaku and as Diaoyu in China, have been based largely on an obscure 1969 United Nations report suggesting the seabed in the area could contain an oil bonanza.
But the document, produced from surveys conducted by an international team of experts, including scientists from China and Japan, never gave any estimate of the reserves and said more research was needed.
“Sediments beneath the continental shelf ... are believed to have great potential as oil and gas reservoirs,” says the report.
“An area several times larger than Taiwan lies north of that island with sediment thicknesses exceeding two kilometres and perhaps reaching the nine kilometre thickness that underlies Taiwan.”
The islands lie some 200 kilometres from Taiwan.