HANOI, Vietnam -- A riot at a steel plant in Vietnam has left one Chinese worker dead and over 100 injured, officials said Thursday, as an angry Beijing accused Hanoi of "connivance" in the worst anti-China unrest in decades.
Long-simmering enmity between the communist neighbors has boiled over in Vietnam with protests in major cities and mobs torching foreign-owned factories after China deployed an oil drilling rig in contested waters.
Worker demonstrations have spread to 22 of Vietnam's 63 provinces, the government said, calling for "tough measures" to bring the situation under control before alarmed foreign investors pull out of the country.
Hundreds of Chinese nationals have fled across the border into neighboring Cambodia, according to police there, amid fears that a wave of patriotic fervour initially encouraged by Hanoi is getting out of hand.
Beijing's increasing assertiveness in staking its claim to almost all of the South China Sea also has caused concern for other neighboring countries, particularly the Philippines.
Manila released photographs Thursday to support its claim that China was reclaiming land on a disputed reef in the South China Sea in an apparent effort to build an airstrip.
Tensions between China and Vietnam flared earlier this month after Beijing moved a deep-water drilling rig into waters that Hanoi claims.
There have been repeated skirmishes near the controversial oil drilling rig in recent days involving vessels from the two countries, with collisions and the use of water cannon.
Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung described the situation as "very serious" and said that, while the recent groundswell of patriotism was "the correct thing," instigators who broke the law would be punished, according to an official statement.
Export-oriented manufacturing is a key pillar of Vietnam's economy, with high-profile companies -- from electronics giants such as South Korea's Samsung (IW 1000/14) to U.S. sportswear companies like Nike (IW 500/52) -- producing goods there.
Taiwan is one of the top foreign investors in Vietnam.
Copyright Agence France-Presse 2014
