Philippine president-elect Ferdinand Marcos Jr yesterday said that he would uphold an international ruling against Beijing over the disputed South China Sea, adding that he would not let China trample on Manila’s maritime rights.
China claims almost all of the resource-rich waterway, through which trillions of dollars in trade passes annually, with competing claims from Taiwan, the Philippines, Brunei, Malaysia and Vietnam.
Beijing has ignored a 2016 decision by The Hague-based Permanent Court of Arbitration that declared its historical claim to be without basis.
Photo: Reuters
Outgoing Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte fostered warmer ties with his more powerful neighbor by setting aside the ruling in exchange for promises of trade and investment, which critics said have not materialized.
In his strongest comments yet on the longstanding source of tensions between the two nations, Marcos Jr said he would not “allow a single millimeter of our maritime coastal rights to be trampled upon.”
“We have a very important ruling in our favor, and we will use it to continue to assert our territorial rights. It is not a claim. It is already our territorial right,” Marcos Jr told selected local media.
“We’re talking about China. We talk to China consistently with a firm voice,” he said.
“We cannot go to war with them. That’s the last thing we need right now,” he added.
Marcos Jr, popularly known as “Bongbong,” secured more than half of the votes in the May 9 election to win the presidency by a wide margin and cap a remarkable comeback for his family.
His father and namesake ruled the Philippines for 20 years, presiding over widespread corruption and human rights abuses before he was ousted in 1986.
Marcos Jr formally takes office on June 30. He and his running mate Sara Duterte, who also won the vice presidential race in a landslide, have embraced the key policies of Rodrigo Duterte.
However, Marcos Jr signaled that on foreign policy he would not adopt the “slightly unorthodox approach” of Rodrigo Duterte, who rattled diplomats with his firebrand rhetoric and mercurial nature.
Marcos Jr indicated he would seek to strike a balance between China and the US, which are vying to have the closest ties with his administration.
“I do not subscribe to the old thinking of the Cold War where we had this spheres of influence where you’re under the Soviet Union or you’re under the United States,” he said.
“I think that we have to find an independent foreign policy where we are friends with everyone. It’s the only way,” he added.
The South China Sea was a key obstacle in Manila’s ties with Beijing and needed to be resolved, said Chester Cabalza of the Manila-based think tank International Development and Security Cooperation.
“If there will be no move coming from Marcos Jr and [Chinese President] Xi Jinping (習近平), the more Beijing will have an upper hand in terms of our strategic relations with China,” he said.
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