Philippines’ Foreign Minister Perfecto Yasay said yesterday that Manila had “vigorously pushed” for the inclusion of a comment on the arbitration ruling in the Asean statement this week but did not want to press the issue and risk dividing the group or provoke China.
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The United States, Japan and Australia have urged China not to construct military outposts and reclaim land in the disputed South China Sea, in a strong show of support for Southeast Asian nations that have territorial disputes with Beijing in the resource-rich area.
Kerry said the maritime dispute has to be resolved “through diplomacy and rule of law”.
But with The Hague ruling in the past, Kerry said he and Wang agreed it is time to lower the temperature.
The three countries issued the statement late on Monday at the conclusion of the trilateral strategic dialogue held between Foreign Affairs Minister Julie Bishop and her United States counterpart John Kerry and Japan’s Fumio Kishida, on the sidelines of a South-east Asian regional security conference in Vientiane, Laos.
Meanwhile, the U.S. -ASEAN foreign ministers meeting was held Monday evening.
The official said Tuesday that Rice told China’s top diplomat and its top general in meetings in Beijing on Monday that the USA hoped a recent worldwide tribunal’s ruling on the South China Sea would spur negotiations in the region toward eventually resolving long-standing territorial disputes.
The ad hoc tribunal issued an award on July 12, siding with Manila’s claims and denying China’s long-standing historic rights in the South China Sea.
China scored a diplomatic victory on Monday as Southeast Asian nations dropped any reference to the court ruling in a joint statement in the face of resolute objections from Cambodia, China’s closest ASEAN ally.
Kerry, who arrived in Manila on Tuesday after attending a regional summit in Laos, met with Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte.
“China and Philippines are both signatories to United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (Unclos) and consistently expressed adherence to worldwide law and abiding commitment to Unclos”, Yasay said in a press briefing on Wednesday.
“States only comply with global law when it serves their interests”, Muhamad Arif, researcher at the Habibie Center think-tank, said on Tuesday during a discussion organized by the center in Jakarta. This includes from eschewing from attempts to take over uninhabited features in the South China Sea, according to a joint statement released.
Mr Kerry was also expected to raise with Mr Duterte US concerns about human rights and the rule of law.
“The dispute in the South China Sea is between the Philippines and China, not ASEAN and China”, he said. The case was brought by a fellow South China Sea claimant, the Philippines.
Instead, China proposes to overcome rising tensions in the South China Sea region and to maintain peace and stability through an ASEAN-China dialogue.
“The Philippines has an unhappy history of extrajudicial killings and violence [against] journalists and others”, a USA official told reporters travelling with the secretary.
“We have made clear that the decision of the arbitral tribunal convened under the [United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea] is legally binding and that we expect the parties will comply with their obligations on the law”, Kerry said in the televised briefing.
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In other words, they urged China to stop doing what it has been enthusiastically doing to the South China Sea for the past couple of years.
