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Friday, March 29, 2024

PH raises ‘serious concern’ over SCS

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The Philippines has raised the “heightened tension” in the South China Sea, which it described as a “serious concern” during the recently concluded G7-ASEAN meet in Liverpool, United Kingdom, the Department of Foreign Affairs said on Tuesday.

Foreign Affairs Secretary Teodoro Locsin Jr. said he extended his gratitude to the G-7 members – UK, United States, Canada, Japan, Germany, France, and Italy – for their support in the reaffirmation of the 1982 United Nations Convention on the Laws of the Sea (UNCLOS) and the 2016 arbitration ruling that invalidated China’s massive nine-dash-line claim over the entire SCS.

“UNCLOS and the 2016 Arbitral Award are the twin anchors of Philippine positions and activities in the South China Sea,” Locsin said.

“We will not raise anchor and drift or sail away from them. We value your support,” he added.

Meanwhile, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Tuesday urged China to cease “aggressive actions” in the Asia-Pacific, speaking during a visit to the region, as Washington seeks to bolster alliances against Beijing.

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President Joe Biden’s administration is trying to reset relations and reassert its influence in Asia after the turbulence and unpredictability of the Donald Trump era.

Blinken’s comments came in Indonesia, the first leg of a Southeast Asian tour, the latest visit to the region by a senior US official in recent months.

In a speech outlining the US approach to what it terms the Indo-Pacific, Blinken said Washington would work with allies and partners to “defend the rules-based order” and that countries should have the right to “choose their own path.”

“That’s why there is so much concern – from Northeast Asia to Southeast Asia and from the Mekong River to the Pacific Islands – about Beijing’s aggressive actions,” he said.

“Claiming open seas as their own. Distorting open markets through subsidies to its state-run companies. Denying the exports or revoking deals for countries whose policies it does not agree with.”

“Countries across the region want this behavior to change – we do too,” he added.

Blinken added that Washington was “determined to ensure freedom of navigation in the South China Sea,” and said Beijing’s actions there threaten the movement of more than 3 trillion dollars’ worth of commerce every year.

But he also stressed that “it’s not about a contest between a US-centric region or a China-centric region – the Indo-Pacific is its own region,” and said Washington wanted to avoid conflict there.

China claims almost all of the resource-rich South China Sea, with competing claims from four Southeast Asian states as well as Taiwan. 

Beijing has been accused of deploying a range of military hardware including anti-ship and surface-to-air missiles there, and has ignored the 2016 international tribunal decision that declared its historical claim over most of the waters to be without basis. With AFP

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