The reform and opening-up policy of the past thirty-plus years has successfully transformed China from an under-developed country into a nation that is now the main driver of the world's economic growth and stability. However, China's peaceful development has met constant, yet groundless, skepticism from certain countries and an endless buzz of distorted views about China's foreign policy.

After the collision between a Chinese fishing boat and two Japanese patrol vessels near the Diaoyu Islands in September 2010, Western media declared that China was becoming increasingly assertive over the Diaoyu Islands and its sovereignty of the South China Sea. China was starting to play tough, they declared. But is that really the case?

China is now the world's second largest economy, the largest merchandise exporter and second largest importer, and holds the world's largest foreign reserves. Yet there are some other realities that the West conveniently ignores: China is a developing economy in need of economic restructuring and transformation and it remains a middle-income country with per capita GDP of about $4,000; there is also a wide divide between the rich and the poor; and healthcare, education, social security and other issues related to public welfare need to be addressed. There is clearly a long way to go before China becomes a real power.

China's primary objective is to maintain economic development through a long-term policy of "building friendship and partnership with neighboring countries", and this is something that will not change.

The West's criticism of China's foreign policy also ignores another important fact: although the disputes over the Diaoyu Islands and South China Sea have a historical legacy, both territories are inalienable parts of China. China's sovereignty over the Diaoyu Islands and the South China Sea are indisputable.

According to the Convention on the Continental Shelf, an international treaty on the rights of a sovereign state over the continental shelf surrounding it, China's sovereignty over the East Sea continental shelf naturally extends to the Diaoyu Islands, which sit on this shelf.

Before the 1895 Sino-Japanese War, Japan never disputed China's sovereignty of the Diaoyu Islands. It was not until the signing of the Treaty of Maguan (known as the Treaty of Shimonoseki in Japan) in 1895, under which the Qing Dynasty (1644-1911) ceded its sovereignty of Taiwan and its adjacent islands, that Japan began to declare its jurisdiction over the Diaoyu Islands. After Japan's defeat in World War II and the signing of the San Francisco Peace Treaty between China and Japan in 1952, the Treaty of Maguan, "became null and void as a consequence of the war", and China resumed sovereignty of the Diaoyu Islands, as was its right.

However, in order to curb China, the United States pulled the Diaoyu Islands into its administrative control of Okinawa after the World War II, planting the seed of conflict between China and Japan when former US president Richard Nixon signed the Reversion of Okinawa agreement in 1971, and Okinawa became a prefecture of Japan.

But such a transfer of custodianship does not constitute legal sovereignty and is simply a means concocted by some countries to contain China.

Any country will seek to counter a threat to its territorial sovereignty. Japan is also involved in a dispute with Russia over the South Kuril Islands, also a legacy of World War II. Russia's de facto control of the islands has led to repeated protests from Japan over the years. However, no international media has ever criticized Japan for being tough or aggressive. It seems the Western media are quite happy to adopt a double standard when it comes to territorial disputes.

Since China and Japan established diplomatic ties, China has continually tried to resolve the dispute over the Daioyu Islands through consultation, and it has put forward the proposal of "shelving disagreements and pursuing joint development" for the greater benefit of both. However, the Japanese government has chosen to disregard these, and has instead intensified its de facto control over the islands.

In February 2005, when Japan announced that it had placed under state control and protection a lighthouse erected on the largest of the islands, the Chinese Foreign Ministry declared: "The Diaoyu Islands and its adjacent islands have always been China's inherent territory, over which China holds indisputable sovereignty. Japan's action constitutes serious provocation and infringement on China's territorial sovereignty. Neither the government nor the people of China can come to terms with that. Any unilateral action taken by Japan is illegal and invalid." This is the same position China demonstrated in the wake of the trawler collision last year. Therefore, the statement that China's foreign policy is getting "tougher" has no basis at all.

There are complicated economic interests behind the sovereignty disputes. Japan covets the abundant maritime resources within the 200-nautical-mile limit of the Diaoyu Islands. Before oil, gas and mineral resources were discovered in the South China Sea, China's sovereignty over the islands had never seriously been challenged. It was also not until the 1980s that countries like the Philippines, Vietnam and Malaysia began to cast covetous eyes at the South China Sea, and attempted to acquire maritime interests by manipulating the gray areas in international treaties on mutual delimitation.

Even more importantly, some countries see control of the Diaoyu Islands and the South China Sea Islands as a way of ring-fencing China.

However, looking forward, China will continue to approach these sovereignty issues with a peaceful mindset and seek solutions through bilateral negotiations.

The author is chairman and president of the Export-Import Bank of China.