The Philippine military yesterday defiantly redeployed two supply boats to provide food to Filipino marines guarding a disputed shoal in the South China Sea after the Chinese coast guard last week used water cannons to forcibly turn the boats away in an assault that drew angry condemnation and warnings from Manila.
Philippine Secretary of National Defense Delfin Lorenzana said the two civilian wooden-hulled boats carrying navy personnel left western Palawan province and should reach the marines stationed on a navy ship at Second Thomas Shoal (Renai Shoal, 仁愛暗沙) in the Spratly Islands (Nansha Islands, 南沙群島) after an overnight trip.
Lorenzana said the boats were not being escorted by the navy or coast guard in accordance with a request by China’s ambassador to Manila, who assured him over the weekend that the boats would not be blocked again.
A navy plane would nevertheless fly over the remote shoal, which has been surrounded by Chinese surveillance ships in a years-long territorial standoff, when the Philippine boats reach it, Lorenzana said.
“The Chinese ambassador assured me they will not be impeded, but they requested there should be no escort,” Lorenzana said.
Asked if he expected the vessels not to be blocked, he said: “We will see.”
The Philippines says the shoal is in its internationally recognized exclusive economic zone, but China claims almost all of the waterway, through which trillions of dollars in trade passes annually, with competing claims from Taiwan, Brunei, Malaysia and Vietnam.
Beijing has ignored a 2016 ruling by The Hague-based Permanent Court of Arbitration that its historical claim is without basis.
Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte condemned the latest flare-up at an Asian regional summit hosted by Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平), who vowed his country would “never seek hegemony, and certainly not bully the small.”
“We abhor the recent event in the Ayungin Shoal and view with grave concern other similar developments,” Duterte told a meeting of the ASEAN and China, using the Filipino name for the shoal. “This does not speak well of the relations between our nations and our partnership.”
Duterte’s remarks were strong for a leader who has fostered warmer ties with Beijing since taking power in 2016 in the hope of extracting promised investment and trade.
It is not clear if Xi was in the meeting when Duterte spoke.
For his part, Xi told the gathering “we must jointly maintain the stability of the South China Sea and build the South China Sea into a sea of peace, friendship and cooperation.”
“China was, is and will always be a good neighbor, good friend and good partner of ASEAN,” Chinse state media quoted him as saying.
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