State media reported on Monday that Vietnam has prohibited the highly anticipated movie “Barbie” from being screened domestically due to a sequence in which a map of China’s unilaterally claimed territory in the South China Sea is shown.
On Chinese maps, the U-shaped “nine-dash line” is used to represent its claims over significant portions of the South China Sea, including large portions of what Vietnam claims to be its continental shelf and places where it has granted oil concessions.
Due to its depiction of China’s contentious nine-dash line, which was rejected in an international arbitration decision by a court in The Hague in 2016, “Barbie” is the most recent movie to be banned in Vietnam. China refuses to accept the judgement.