西沙群岛
China claims the sea and land inside the "nine-dashed line" which covers about 80% of the South China Sea as its territory, which includes the Paracel Islands. On the other hand, Vietnam has attributed China's forceful occupation of the Paracel Islands as an illegitimate way to gain possession of the Paracel Islands, and denounced the gross violation of Vietnam's sovereignty by the People's Republic of China. Vietnam's claims to the Paracel Islands stem from their early historical rights, as well as the economic heritage value of the Islands to Vietnam. The Vietnamese have claimed to had knowledge of the Hoang Sa Islands long before Westerners arrived to the South China Sea and publicised the name of "Paracels" internationally. It has also been scientifically determined that the Vietnamese presence on the Paracel Islands started in the 15th century. The oldest Vietnamese document on national heritage, done sometime between 1630 and 1653 by a scholar named Do Ba, has identified the Paracel Islands, then known as "yellow sand", as a destination frequented by the Vietnamese authorities to obtain big quantities of gold.