After bowing to Beijing’s request to retract his decision to plant a flag on Thitu Island over Philippine Independence Day, the President Rodrigo Duterte has likely angered the Chinese again.
For Duterte, it is better to solve an Asian geopolitical problem with “no foreign forces”, limiting talks from one “Asian neighbor to another”.
In the face of China’s continued assertiveness, other nations are partnering up to increase defense cooperation, including Vietnam and India.
On July 12, an international tribunal in The Hague issued a scathing rebuttal to China’s expansive claims. What has been Beijing’s reaction so far?
An international tribunal in The Hague has ruled that China’s expansive claim to sovereignty over waters in the South China Sea had no legal basis.
Should Beijing refuse to honor a potential ruling against their claims of sovereignty, we can expect China to again attempt to assert its economic muscle to persuade other regional nations to settle the disputes bilaterally.
Here in Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon), the local government last week ordered its travel and tourism departments to draw up a feasibility study for tours to the Truong Sa (Spratly) islands, which Vietnam currently occupies.
On Saturday in Singapore, U.S. Defense Secretary Ashton Carter addressed the attendants at the 14th Shangri-La Dialogue, a high-level security forum, asserting China’s recent land reclamation in the South China Sea was “out of step” with international norms, and adding his opposition to “any further militarization” in the region.
This week, leaders from 10 Southeast Asian nations will gather on the Malaysian resort island of Langkawi for the 26th Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) Summit.
In the latest spark added to the ongoing fire over territorial waters in the South China Sea, a diplomatic protest was handed to Beijing’s charge d’affairs in Manila on Tuesday. The move follows the alleged firing of a water cannon by a Chinese government vessel on January 27 to drive away two Filipino fishing boats […]
A quick glance at the above map is enough to boggle anyone’s senses, but these lines are likely to be heavily debated by officials from the 10-member Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) and China, following meetings over last weekend. Senior Asean officials and China yesterday agreed to speed up the process of finishing the […]
photo by Getty Images Beijing’s recent actions to extend its naval presence in the South and East China Sea, coupled with a perceived reluctance to solve territorial claims, is seriously undermining security among its neighbors, especially in the Philippines. Last year, in the waters Manila refers to as the West Philippine Sea, China’s occupied the […]
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