The Philippines and China yesterday summoned each other’s following a clash at a disputed shoal in the South China Sea, which sparked condemnation of Beijing by Manila’s allies.
Beijing claims sovereignty over almost the entire South China Sea, a vital global trade route, despite an international ruling that found its claims have no legal basis.
Multiple nations in the region, including the Philippines, have territorial claims that overlap with China’s, and altercations regularly occur in the heavily patrolled waterway.
Photo: Reuters
The Philippine military accused the China Coast Guard of clubbing a Filipino sailor with a baton on Monday as they approached a grounded vessel that has long served as a Philippine garrison.
Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr yesterday met with China’s ambassador to Manila on Tuesday after summoning the envoy over the incident at the flashpoint Second Thomas Shoal (Renai Shoal, 仁愛暗沙), presidential spokeswoman Claire Castro told reporters.
She declined to give details of the meeting, but said it had involved a matter of “national security.”
Earlier in the day, the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs said it had “urgently summoned” the Philippine ambassador “to lodge solemn representations over the Philippines’ deliberate provocation and attack ... at Renai Reef,” using its Chinese name.
“The Philippine side provoked first, yet it has turned the blame upside down, distorted the facts and maliciously hyped the issue,” the Chinese ministry said in a statement.
Key Philippine allies condemned the clash, with Australian Minister for Foreign Affairs Penny Wong (黃英賢) slamming “destabilizing and dangerous conduct” by China.
Wong’s comment came after Washington condemned Beijing’s “dangerous and aggressive actions.”
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio yesterday landed in Manila for the ASEAN summit.
Rubio has said he is open to a meeting with his Chinese Minister of Foreign Affairs Wang Yi (王毅), who will also attend the ASEAN summit, though talks have not been publicly confirmed.
The two met last year on the sidelines of an ASEAN gathering in Kuala Lumpur and again in Munich in February.
In an opinion piece published in Philippine media outlets yesterday, Rubio heralded Washington’s commitment “to freedom of navigation in Southeast Asia” while reaffirming the US defensive umbrella in the region.
“This freedom is by no means guaranteed. If these waters were to fall under the control of a power willing to use trade as a geopolitical weapon, both the United States and the ASEAN states would face serious new threats to their sovereignty, security, and economic future,” he wrote, in an apparent allusion to China.
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