The US, Japan and the Philippines on Friday staged joint naval drills to boost crisis readiness off a disputed South China Sea shoal as a Chinese military ship kept watch from a distance.
The Chinese frigate attempted to get closer to the waters, where the warships and aircraft from the three allied countries were undertaking maneuvers off the Scarborough Shoal — also known as Huangyan Island (黃岩島) and claimed by Taiwan and China — in an unsettling moment but it was warned by a Philippine frigate by radio and kept away.
“There was a time when they attempted to maneuver closer but, again, we challenged them,” Philippine Navy Commander Irvin Ian Robles told reporters on board the frigate BRP Jose Rizal.
Photo: AP
The latest naval drills, called the Multilateral Maritime Cooperative Activity, were opened for the first time to a small group of Manila-based media since such high-seas maneuvers and joint naval sails began last year.
During the daylong maneuvers, the BRP Jose Rizal; the DDG Shoup, a US Navy guided-missile destroyer; and the JS Noshiro, a Japanese multi-mission frigate, sailed in formation and communicated by radio. US and Philippine helicopters flew around. A small group of US sailors from the DDG Shoup used a speedboat to transfer to the BRP Jose Rizal and hold discussions with Filipino counterparts.
“We are here to support our allies, and support a free and open Indo-Pacific for everyone,” US Navy Lieutenant Alexander Horvath said.
Such naval drills result in “the vital improvements in our coordination, tactics and shared maritime awareness,” Philippine Armed Forces Chief of Staff General Romeo Brawner Jr said in a statement.
“Every iteration strengthens our capacity to respond to maritime security challenges while reinforcing our collective ability to safeguard our national interests,” Brawner said.
China claims virtually the entire South China Sea. A 2016 international arbitration ruling invalidated those claims, but Beijing refused to participate in the arbitration, rejected the outcome and continues to defy it.
Taiwan, Vietnam, Malaysia and Brunei have also been involved in the long-seething territorial disputes, but confrontations between Chinese and Philippine coast guard and naval forces have particularly spiked in the past two years.
The US, Japan and the Philippines have been strengthening a security alliance and pressing efforts to bolster deterrence against China’s growing assertiveness in the South China Sea, a key global trade route.
The trilateral security bloc emerged during the administration of former US president Joe Biden.
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