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South China Sea
US Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth on Saturday urged Southeast Asian nations to stand firm and strengthen their maritime forces to counter China's increasingly destabilising actions in the South China Sea. Speaking at a meeting in Malaysia with his counterparts from the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, Hegseth reiterated US concern over what he called China's aggression in the disputed waters that intensified in recent months, citing incidents such as the ramming of vessels and the use of water cannons. The South China Sea remains one of Asia's most volatile flashpoints. Beijing claims almost the entire region, while ASEAN members, the Philippines, Vietnam, Malaysia and Brunei also claim ownership of coastal areas and features. The Philippines, a key US ally, has had frequent clashes with China's maritime fleet. Manila has repeatedly urged a stronger regional response, but ASEAN has traditionally sought to balance caution with economic ties to Beijing, the region's largest ...
A tropical storm lashed the northern and central Philippines over the weekend, killing seven people after forcing more than 22,000 people to evacuate from flood- and landslide-prone villages. Tropical Storm Fengshen blew away from the main northern Philippine region of Luzon into the South China Sea late on Sunday. It currently has sustained winds of up to 65 kilometres per hour and gusts of up to 80 kilometres per hour, government forecasters said. The government's disaster-mitigation agency said seven deaths were reported. Nearly 14,000 people who evacuated remained displaced from their homes by Monday, the agency said. One person drowned on Saturday in Roxas City in the central province of Capiz, where high tide worsened flooding in many villages, officials said. Five people, including two children, died while they were sleeping when their hut was hit early Sunday by a huge palm tree that they had burned before to try to topple it for safety reasons in Pitogo town in the eastern
A Chinese coast guard ship used a powerful water cannon on Sunday then rammed and slightly damaged an anchored Philippine government vessel off an island inhabited by Filipinos in the disputed South China Sea, said the Philippine coast guard. There were no injuries among Filipino crewmen of the BRP Datu Pagbuaya, part of the fisheries fleet that provides support to Filipino fishermen. The Chinese coast guard targeted Pagbuaya off the Philippines-occupied Thitu island in the latest flare-up of the long-simmering territorial disputes involving Manila, Beijing and four other governments. China did not immediately issue any reaction but has repeatedly restated its sovereignty and control over virtually the entire South China Sea, a major trade route, despite a 2016 arbitration ruling that invalidated its historic claims. That ruling has been rejected by China but supported by the United States and its Western and Asian allies. Pagbuaya and two other Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic ...
China's coast guard accused a Philippine ship of deliberately ramming one of its vessels on Tuesday near Scarborough Shoal, a disputed territory that both countries claim in the South China Sea. A coast guard statement said more than 10 Philippine government ships coming from various directions entered the waters around the shoal, which is called Huangyan island in Chinese. It said it deployed water cannons against the vessels. The encounter came six days after China announced it was designating part of Scarborough Shoal as a national nature reserve. There was no immediate comment from the Philippines. The government in Manila said last week it was filing a diplomatic protest against the designation of a nature reserve at what it calls Bajo de Masinloc. China and the Philippines have clashed repeatedly around outcroppings in the South China Sea, which China claims almost in its entirety. The two countries are among several that have competing claims to territory in the waters, whic
Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. said Monday his country would inevitably be drawn kicking and screaming into any war over Taiwan due to its proximity to the self-ruled island and the presence of large numbers of Filipino workers there, despite China's strong protest over such remarks. Marcos also told a news conference that the Philippines' coast guard, navy and other vessels defending its territorial interests in the South China Sea would never back down and would stand their ground in the contested waters after the Chinese coast guard on Monday staged dangerous blocking maneuvers and used a powerful water cannon to try to drive away Philippine vessels from the hotly disputed Scarborough Shoal. It's the latest flare-up of long-simmering territorial disputes in the busy waterway, a key global trade route, where overlapping claims between China and the Philippines have escalated in recent years. Vietnam, Malaysia, Brunei and Taiwan also lay claims to parts of the contested .
India's position on the South China Sea is "clear and consistent," and it considers it as part of the global commons, the Ministry of External Affairs said on Tuesday. In response to a query raised during a special briefing here on the ongoing visit of Philippine President Ferdinand R Marcos Jr, MEA Secretary (East) P Kumaran said India has an "abiding interest" in peace and stability in the region. He was asked about the just-held India-Philippines bilateral naval exercise off the Philippines. According to reports, the exercise also took place in parts of the South China Sea.
China's Education Ministry issued a safety warning for Chinese students in the Philippines after what it said were a series of criminal incidents targeting them. The brief warning Friday did not identify any specific incidents but told students to increase their safety awareness should they choose to study in the Philippines. The number of Chinese students in the country was not given but enrolments have fallen to just a few hundred in recent years, according to the Hong Kong newspaper South China Morning Post. Relations between the governments of China and the Philippines are particularly tense due to disputes over maritime claims in the South China Sea, which China claims almost in its entirety. China has used water cannons and other non-lethal shipboard deterrents to drive off Philippine fishing boats. Politically, China has dismissed a UN-backed court decision in The Hague that ruled out most of China's claims in the South China Sea and has expressed resentment over close ties .
President Donald Trump will host his Philippine counterpart in the White House very soon to discuss how the longtime treaty allies can further deepen their security and economic engagements, the Philippine ambassador to the US said Friday. No date has been specified for President Ferdinand Marcos Jr.'s meeting with Trump in Washington but Ambassador Jose Manuel Romualdez said that it would happen very soon this month. The allies have boosted mutual defense engagements, including large-scale combat exercises in the Philippines, to strengthen deterrence against China's increasingly aggressive actions in the region. Among the proposed topics for discussion is strengthening peace through deterrence, Romualdez told The Associated Press by telephone, echoing Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth 's remarks about the US military's plan to ratchet up deterrence against China's increasingly assertive actions in the disputed South China Sea by intensifying military and defense engagements with the ..
The United States. Australia, India and Japan have agreed to expand their cooperation on maritime security in the Indo-Pacific and further collaborate on supplies of critical minerals and rare earths that are key components of high-tech production. The foreign ministers of the four countries, known as the "Quad", met in Washington on Tuesday as the Trump administration seeks to expand US influence in the Indo-Pacific to compete with a rising China amid tensions with partners over trade and defense issues. In a joint meeting with his three colleagues, Secretary of State Marco Rubio said the Quad must be a vehicle for action that goes beyond statements of intent and stressed that commerce and trade will be critical to ensuring the group's relevance in the future. To that end, the four announced in a statement the creation of a Quad Critical Minerals Initiative that aims to strengthen economic security and collective resilience by collaborating on securing and diversifying critical ...