TO GO WITH Philippines-China-military-US-maritime-diplomacy,FOCUS by Cecil Morella This photo taken on June 7, 2014 shows the Philippine Navy frigate BRP Ramon Alacraz anchored at the mouth of the South China Sea in Ulugan Bay off Puerto Princesa on Palawan island. Ulugan Bay, with a coastline partly concealed by thick mangrove forests, is at the centre […]

Washington: China is ‘coercing’ its neighbours to reorder the Indo-Pacific region to its advantage, the Pentagon has told Congress amid Beijing flexing its muscles in the East and South China Seas. As China continues its economic and military ascendance, asserting power through an all-of-nation long-term strategy, it will continue to pursue a military modernisation programme […]

MANILA, Philippines — British Defense Secretary Gavin Williamson’s confirmation that a UK warship will sail in the South China Sea sends provocative signals to China, a Chinese state-run tabloid said. Earlier this week, Williamson confirmed that British warship HMS Sutherland will sail through the South China Sea next month to assert freedom of navigation in […]

Under Singapore’s chairmanship of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, Beijing is rapidly deepening military-to-military relations with its smaller neighbours. During the Asean Defence Ministers Meetings Plus earlier this month, China and Southeast Asian countries agreed on a series of new initiatives to solidify their burgeoning ties. Later this year, the two sides are set […]

An abundance of oil has supported the extravagant and famous lifestyles of Brunei’s royal family and their coterie of well connected elites for decades. But it now appears the tiny sultanate has fallen on hard times, a situation that has been setting off alarm bells not only among some within the country, but also in […]

WASHINGTON: China is coercing its neighbours to reorder the Indo-Pacific region, the Pentagon told Congress in its annual budget proposals for the fiscal 2019, beginning October 1 this year. Trump administration today released their proposal for the fiscal year 2019 budget. Fiscal years are different from calendar years. The budgetary proposal covers October 1, 2018, […]

SYDNEY, Australia – A British warship will sail from Australia through the disputed South China Sea next month to assert freedom of navigation rights, a senior official said Tuesday in a move likely to irk Beijing. China claims nearly all of the resource-rich waterway and has been turning reefs and islets into islands and installing […]

China has spent years building military outposts on a group of contested islands in the South China Sea — a project that has left the country at odds with many of its neighbors and the United States. First, there was the dredging, in which ships sucked sediment from the seabed and pumped it atop formerly […]

MANILA, Philippines — Why is China interested in conducting research in the Philippine Rise, an area in the Western Pacific where it has no maritime territorial claim? One possible answer, according to official sources: Beijing is seeking naming rights for seven or eight submarine mountains or seamounts and ridges in Benham or Philippine Rise and […]

The United States Navy (USN) conducted a freedom of navigation operation (FONOP) in the South China Sea on Jan 17 and, as anticipated, it created a current of excitement among security analysts. The main bugbear being that the operations were conducted within the 12 nautical miles of Scarborough Shoal that China claims as part of […]