But an earlier claim to have won Fiji's support backfired after it was quickly repudiated by the Fijian government. Expansion: The China-built lighthouse on Zhubi Reef of Nansha Islands in the South China Sea. Credit:Xinhua/AP The tiny Pacific nations are being duchessed ahead of an expected international arbitration ruling on Beijing's territorial claims - a decision China has already promised to ignore. China has constructed runways and deep sea ports on several coral atolls inside the disputed waters after dredging the sea floor, sparking a legal challenge by the Philippines. A ruling in the arbitration case is expected this month, with the outcome watched closely by the US and allies such as Australia that have criticised China's actions.

China's latest south Pacific blitz will be seen as an alarming echo of its past struggles with Taiwan in the region, where millions in dubious aid promises changed hands in order to win prized diplomatic recognition. A map showing part of China's "nine-dash line" in the South China Sea. Credit:New York Times None of the Pacific nations are directly involved in the South China Sea dispute, but Tess Newton Cain of TNC Pacific Consulting in Port Vila said China was demonstrating its presence as a regional power with international reach. Vanuatu Prime Minister Charlot Salwai last month issued a public statement in support of Beijing, criticising the legal proceedings and declaring territorial claims "must be based on the historical and cultural facts". China's ambassador in Vanuatu also had a full-page question and answer article published in the local Daily Post newspaper.

China has drawn a wide arc known as the "nine-dash line" to claim ancient control over most of the South China Sea - overlapping claims by Taiwan, the Philippines, Vietnam and other south-east Asian nations. "There are other countries in the Pacific that we might expect to be voicing support for China, including Samoa and Tonga, where there has been even more Chinese investment by way of grants and loans than we have seen in Vanuatu," Dr Newton Cain said. Beijing has made no secret of its efforts to win support. In what was described as a rare press conference in Samoa last month, Chinese diplomats also claimed China was the "victim" in the dispute. Meanwhile in Tonga, China's ambassador said in a speech that "Chinese people were the first to discover, name and develop" islands in the South China Sea, and went on to claim Vietnam, Malaysia and the Philippines only declared sovereignty in the 1970s after the discovery of oil and gas reserves. PNG Foreign Minister Rimbink Pato was reported on Radio New Zealand as saying that diplomatic overtures had been also made from China but that PNG expected the dispute to be resolved according to international law.

China's Xinhua news agency reported in April that Fiji and China's foreign ministers had agreed to a joint statement supporting "China's proposition" and efforts to resolve the South China Sea "through friendly consultations" rather than legal action. But a day after the meeting, government-controlled media in Fiji reported the Pacific nation offered no such support for China. The Solomon Islands, Tuvalu, Kiribati and Nauru all have diplomatic relations with Taiwan rather than China. Taiwan's new defence minister Feng Shih-kuan told Parliament on Monday the island would not recognise any air defence zone declared by China over the South China Sea. Follow Fairfax World on Facebook