Since July 2016 when the Philippines won an unenforceable decision at the Hague at a law of the sea tribunal that was filed in 2013, the country under Rodrigo Duterte has acquiesced to China’s occupation of the waterways and sparse bits of reef, rock and turf.
What was most important in the eyes of Philippines fisher folk whom FPMag has interviewed, was that the tribunal ruled that fisher folk from the Philippines and those from China had traditional fishing rights at Scarborough Shoal. But China has blocked the Filipino fishing boats, aggressively.
by Melissa Hemingway and Micheal John
Looks like…
Duterte’s cabinet is using the American social media platform Twitter to look back during a retreat over its collective and figurative shoulder to swear at The People’s Republic of China like a beaten schoolboy walking away from a fight scene where the loser wet his trousers in fear.
Screen Capture of Twitter Comment
Everyone in the area has claimed bits of Scarborough Shoal including Taiwan. But China possesses the region these past five years and that is not going to change, says Beijing.
Read: Philippines Scarborough Shoal loss is tragic due to loss of food
Joe Biden’s Climate Change Czar comes to Philippines to Support Duterte’s bid for Oil and Gas Resources under the South China Sea?
Last Wednesday the seat of Philippines power in Manila at the palace of Philippines ‘strongman president Rodrigo Duterte—called ‘Malacañang Palace’—welcomed US 1st United States Special Presidential Envoy for Climate, John Kerr.
The Philippines, according to its President Rodrigo Duterte, is interested in the South China Sea claims it has made not for fishing rights of the poor Filipinos, but for natural resources for the big wealthy corporations, specifically oil and gas.
This paradox makes it hard to understand why Joseph Biden sent Presidential Envoy for Climate Change John Kerry to help bolster the Philippines sudden and recent (in Duterte reign) interest in making an issue of China’s occupation of the South China Sea. Kerry has been promising to oppose fiendish zealotry for burning fossil fuels. Kerry is a fake? Biden is a hypocrite? What gives?
Duterte has clearly said this is about oil and gas natural resources under the China Sea, specifically around 190 trillion cubic feet of natural gas and 11 billion barrels of oil according to regional estimates.
Shoot them dead? Duck, Carpio? Duck del Rosario?
From his seat of Philippines power comes a litany of Duterte promises of murder. “Shoot them dead,” was the edict to police and the military against persons breaking the ‘Malacanang Palace’ rules for a national COVID-19 lockdown. The international Criminal Court is examining thousands of cases of murder that allegedly were ordered by the men at Malacanang.
The most recent attacks are directed at critics of Duterte’s five-year acquiesces to China on South China Sea issues.
Duterte claims that bringing up the matter would have started a war. But now Duterte’s cabinet is using the American social media platform Twitter to look back over its collective and figurative shoulder to swear at China like a beaten schoolboy walking away from a fight scene where he wet his pants in fear.
China’s claims of fishing rights for all of South China Sea are Patently outrageous.
There is not much about China’s nine-dash-line claim over 90% of the South China Sea that has logic or legitimacy to it, but possession of the myriad of jutting bits of coral, turf and rock is maintained for the best part of the last decade by China. China has filled in with sand and built up into military bases and homes, many of these jutting rocks.
Meanwhile China’s claims of South China Sea fishing rights are as much challenged as they are in South America, says Ecuadorian officials, and others of the world’s fisheries where China has been overfishing (says a Yale University report) and upsetting many seafaring nations.
What is this? Duck, Carpio? Duck del Rosario?
Meanwhile the intellectual criticisms of two former officials of the Philippines, men who have filed a complaint to the International Criminal Court against Xi Jinping and authored much of the 2013 winning case against China in the Hague Tribunal, attracted a Sunday statement full of carious outbursts from ‘Malacanang Palace’ that may, said a doctor in Manila, “just be disguised cryptic messages to have them assassinated because they criticized the President. We just don’t know anymore who is next.”
“The outbursts of Justice Carpio and Secretary Del Rosario are not helping our country. They demand that the President adopt hardline all or nothing policies. However, history shows that countries who demand all or nothing policies often get nothing at all, or even end up provoking war. This is exactly what the President is avoiding. Because all or nothing policies are not only inconsistent with international law and international reality—they are dangerous and they will not work.”
“As a lawyer and a diplomat respectively, Justice Carpio and Secretary Del Rosario should know better. They do know better. Therefore, they should stop misleading and endangering our people with illegal, impractical, and irresponsible statements. They should leave international relations to the one who has the foresight, information, and constitutional mandate to make sound foreign policy decisions. They should let the President Rodrigo Roa Duterte pursue his careful, calibrated, and calculated foreign policy to its ultimate success.” Citing: Illegal, Impractical and Irresponsible: Why Retired Justice Carpio and Former Secretary Del Rosario Are Wrong about the West Philippine Sea
Are these men being threatened?
Melissa Hemingway