China bent on pushing sea claim – think tank

ASIAN Century Philippines Strategic Studies, a Manila-based think tank, said the August 5 water cannon incident between Chinese and Filipino vessels in the disputed West Philippine Sea highlights China's uncompromising initiative to claim the area. The think tank's president Herman Tiu Laurel told The Manila Times that President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. has realized the gravity of the situation, prompting him to issue a statement countering earlier declarations by the Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) and the National Task Force for the West Philippine Sea (NTF-WPS) that the 2016 ruling of the Arbitral Tribunal in The Hague has made the Ayungin Shoal part of the Philippines' exclusive economic zone. "President Marcos acknowledged that the Ayungin Shoal is a 'gray area' disputed by China and the Philippines which is a laudable sense of realism," said Laurel. "They forget that it's the President who is the architect of Philippine foreign policy," said Laurel. Laurel added that China, through its embassy in Manila, is pushing for the two countries to "meet halfway" and to avoid "countries outside the region to meddle with, sow discord and provoke conflicts." "There is a strong sense among some analysts that the US had an invisible hand in stoking the episode and orchestrating the tsunami of propaganda to inflame the public, prepare the ground for the PCG-US Coast Guard joint maritime patrols later the year, and support the expansion of the [Enhanced Defense Cooperation Agreement]," he pointed out. In 1999, the Philippines deliberately ran the BRP Sierra Madre aground on Second Thomas Shoal in the Spratly Islands to serve as an outpost of the Philippine Marine Corps and assert the country's sovereignty in the disputed territory. Since then, China has repeatedly demanded that the ship be removed from the area. Laurel said that since 2011, there has been an increasing effort to convert the deteriorating BRP Sierra Madre into a more permanent installation. He added that Philippine ships reportedly have been delivering not only food, water, fuel and other supplies to the Filipino troops in the area but construction materials as well. "This is the reason why on August 5, the Chinese vessels stopped the delivery of construction materials which the Philippines would use to reconstruct its ship used as an anchor for its claim," Laurel said.

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