Reporters from Kyodo News and other media outlets witnessed first-hand recently just how close vessels from China and the Philippines are getting to one another during the two nations’ long running territorial dispute in the South China Sea.
The reporters were aboard a 44-meter Philippine Coast Guard patrol ship earlier this month when it and two other Philippine vessels were shadowed for over four hours by three China Coast Guard ships, one of which came within 300 meters.
The Philippine ships were on a mission between Dec. 12 and Dec. 14 to deliver supplies to fishermen at the Sabina Shoal within the country’s exclusive economic zone, one of several contested shoals in the resource-rich sea and an emerging flashpoint in the dispute.
The two Philippine coast guard vessels and a government-funded supply boat were halfway through their journey to the shoal when they were intercepted by the three Chinese patrol ships.
“Every time we sped up, they sped up too,” a Philippine coast guard official said in a frustrated tone.
As the Philippine ships got closer to the shoal, the Chinese vessels became even more aggressive forcing the Philippine ships to stop or slow down. The game of cat-and-mouse carried on until the early evening on Dec. 12 before the Philippine coast guard finally turned around and headed to a different shoal.
The Philippine Coast Guard official said later the China Coast Guard had issued multiple radio warnings to them to turn off course or “suffer the consequences.”
“It’s hard (to move forward) when your ship may get water cannoned…we also (had to) think about the safety of our crew,” the official told reporters.
The decision to withdraw was made hours after another group of Chinese coast guard vessels had fired water cannons at Filipino fishermen at the shoal and cut the anchor lines of their boats, injuring three of them and damaging two fishing boats, in what the Philippines said was China’s first direct attack on civilian fishermen.
The two incidents are part of the ongoing tensions between Beijing and other nations over sovereignty of the South China Sea, disputes that besides the Philippines also involve Brunei, Malaysia, Vietnam and Taiwan.
In 2016, the Permanent Court of Arbitration in The Hague invalidated China’s sweeping claims, but the country rejected the decision and has continued its military buildup in the area.
The Philippine Coast Guard has said it monitored a total of eight China Coast Guard ships in the vicinity of the Sabina Shoal between Dec. 12 and Dec. 14. A warship and two militia boats as well as two Chinese Navy choppers were also sighted.
Chinese Defense Ministry spokesman Jiang Bin said Wednesday the shoal, which he called Xianbin Jiao, is part of the Spratly Islands, which China has indisputable sovereignty over.
“China has taken the necessary measures to safeguard its territorial sovereignty and maritime rights,” he said regarding the Philippine vessels that “illegally intruded” into the lagoon of the shoal.
Sabina Shoal, known to Filipinos as Escoda Shoal, located 75 nautical miles off the Philippines’ western island of Palawan, emerged as a new flashpoint between China and the Philippines in 2024 when China reportedly started reclaiming the shoal. The Philippine Coast Guard sent a large guard vessel there in April last year to monitor Chinese activities.
However, the vessel was withdrawn in September last year after it ran out of supplies and Chinese ships began to constantly patrol around the shoal.
Commodore Jay Tarriela, a Philippine Coast Guard spokesman, said on Dec. 13 the Philippines’ withdrawal marked a “turning point.” It had allowed China to deploy its ships around the shoal, which is located near the sea’s gas-rich Reed Bank and about 50 nautical miles from the militarized Mischief Reef, which China has fortified into an artificial island, making it easier for them to deploy military assets, he said.
But Tarriela said Manila intends to keep sending its patrol ships to the vicinity “so as not to legitimize the presence of (the) Chinese there.”
