The Philippines and China exchanged diplomatic salvoes Tuesday after a confrontation between the countries' coast guards that morning near the contested Second Thomas Shoal in the South China Sea.
"The Philippines demands that Chinese vessels leave the vicinity of Ayungin Shoal immediately," the Phillippines Department of Foreign Affairs said in a statement, using the United States ally's term for the Spratly Islands feature.
A government convoy bearing fresh supplies and personnel to the Philippine marine outpost at the shoal was intercepted by a blockading force of Chinese coast guard and paramilitary "maritime militia" ships. The resulting standoff saw unsafe maneuvers and collisions. Manila said several of a patrol boat's crew members were injured in a China Coast Guard water cannon blast.
The situation is "not normal," Vincent Trinidad, a spokesperson for the Philippine Navy, warned that day, citing China's gradually expanded activity in those waters over the past three decades.
China asserts territorial claims over most of the South China Sea, based on unspecified historical rights. This includes areas like the Second Thomas Shoal that lie within the internationally recognized exclusive economic zone of the Philippines. Beijing maintains the installation at the disputed atoll, a rusting warship Manila ran aground to stake its claim, violates its sovereignty.
Zhou was summoned "to convey the Philippines' protest against the aggressive actions undertaken by the China Coast Guard and Chinese Maritime Militia" during the mission to Ayungin Shoal, read a department statement.
The embassy released its own statement saying it had lodged representations with the Philippines over the "illegal trespassing."
The Chinese embassy in Manila said in its own statement that day that Philippine vessels intruded into the waters adjacent to the Ren'ai Jiao of China's Nansha Islands without the permission of the Chinese government, attempting to deliver supplies, including construction materials, to the warship that is illegally "grounded" on the Ren'ai Jiao (Second Thomas Shoal).
The statement said that by proceeding with the supply mission, the Philippines was reneging on past commitments without specifying these alleged commitments.
Newsweek reached out to the Chinese embassy in Manila for comment.
Beijing's diplomatic mission called the Chinese Coast Guard's conduct "professional, restrained, reasonable and lawful."
The confrontation underscored the unpredictability of South China Sea flashpoints and their potential to spark a great power conflict. That day, the U.S. State Department reiterated that an attack on Philippine assets or nationals anywhere would trigger the countries' shared defense treaties.
However, incidents like that of the most recent supply mission are not being considered attacks. Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos told reporters Wednesday: "I do not think that it is a time or the reason to invoke the Mutual Defense Treaty."
"Given earlier precedent of the treaty not being invoked by either Manila or Washington late last year when a water cannon attack by People's Republic of China forces led to injuries, I believe Beijing senses impunity to keep doing the same," Collin Koh, a maritime security expert with Singapore's Nanyang Technological University, told Newsweek.
He predicted an emboldened China would continue responding as has been, and that it's wishful thinking the Philippines under President Marcos "will be cowed into inaction."
Confrontations like Tuesday's "may even potentially result in fatalities or at least more serious injuries, if Manila and Washington don't revisit the premises and assumptions underpinning the Mutual Defense Treaty," he said.
Despite collisions and water cannon deployment seen during resupply missions late last year, the one last month appeared to go off without a hitch.
That mission came on the heels of a private meeting in Shanghai between high-ranking Chinese and Philippine diplomats. The two sides agreed to deal calmly with incidents, if any, through diplomacy," according to the Department of Foreign Affairs statement on the meeting.
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Newsweek is committed to challenging conventional wisdom and finding connections in the search for common ground.
About the writer
Micah McCartney is a reporter for Newsweek based in Taipei, Taiwan. He covers U.S.-China relations, East Asian and Southeast Asian ... Read more
