Sea feud with China flares as Marcos prepares for presidency

MANILA, Philippines (AP) — The Philippine government announced Tuesday a new diplomatic protest against China over disputes in the South China Sea, a long-thorny issue that has flared anew as the next Philippine president prepares to take office next month. The Philippines has filed hundreds of diplomatic protests against Beijing in recent years for what it considers acts of aggression in the disputed waters, despite improved ties between Beijing and Manila under outgoing President Rodrigo Duterte, whose six-year term ends on June 30. The territorial conflicts are among the key challenges President-elect Ferdinand Marcos Jr. will face when he takes office after his landslide electoral victory on May 9. He has said he will use diplomatic means with China over the issue, the same approach adopted by Duterte, who has been criticized for not taking a more aggressive stance against Beijing’s increasingly assertive actions in the resource-rich and busy waterway. The Department of Foreign Affairs said Tuesday it filed a diplomatic protest over China’s imposition early this month of an annual fishing ban lasting three and a half months that covers areas in the disputed waters where “the Philippines has sovereignty, sovereign rights and jurisdiction.” It said the ban is not limited to Chinese fishing vessels and violates the 1982 U.N. Convention on the Law of the Sea and a 2016 arbitration tribunal’s decision that invalidated Beijing’s vast historic claims in the strategic waterway and upheld the Philippines’ sovereign rights in a stretch of coastal waters called its exclusive economic zone. China does not recognize the arbitration ruling and continues to defy it. The Chinese ban “has no basis in law, and undermines the mutual trust, confidence, and respect that should underpin bilateral relations,“ the department said in a statement. “The Philippines calls on China to comply with its obligations under international law” and “cease and desist from the conduct of illegal actions,” including its “annual practice of declaring a fishing ban over areas that extend far beyond China’s legitimate maritime entitlements,” it said.

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