New photographic evidences revealed that China appears to have installed weapons on the artificial islands it built in the South China Sea, Reuters reported citing a US think tank report.

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The findings by the Asia Maritime Transparency Initiative (AMTI) at the Center for Strategic and International Studies comes amid China's statement that it does not intend to militarize the trade strategic islands.

However, AMTI published satellite images taken on November that appear to show anti-aircraft and anti-missile systems in all seven artificial islands, where several countries claim territorial rights, the BBC noted.

It further revealed that it had been tracking construction of hexagonal-shaped buildings and military length airstrips on Fiery Cross, Mischief, and Subi reefs in the Spratly Islands for several months. Although the new structures were noted to be an "evolution" of buildings from three other islands, AMTI highly believes that all these structures are military defense fortress.

The group also said that some buildings even appear to house anti-aircraft guns and what appears to be close-in weapon systems used to detect and shoot down missiles or aircrafts. Other images from Fiery Cross Reef also depict towers that likely house targeting radars.

"These gun and probable CIWS emplacements show that Beijing is serious about defence of its artificial islands in case of an armed contingency in the South China Sea," the group noted.

Meanwhile, the US State Department said it will not comment about the intelligence report, but spokesman John Kirby called on China and other claimants to "commit to peacefully managing and resolving disputes, to refrain from further land reclamation and construction of new facilities and the militarization of disputed features."

China, on the other hand, is yet to give its comment about the report.

Tagsartificial islands China, artificial islands South China Sea, military weapons China, spratly islands, Asia Maritime Transparency Initiative