The US and India practiced hunting submarines in a joint exercise in the Indian Ocean last week. They were the first anti-submarine warfare exercises since the signing of the Communications, Compatibility and Security Agreement (COMCASA) last fall. The agreement allows for real-time intelligence sharing between the US and India, making it easier for the […]
THE PHILIPPINES is shifting its stance on the hotly disputed South China Sea by strengthening the nation’s relationship with the US. As the midterm elections in the Philippines approach, President Rodrigo Duterte is attempting to overturn his “soft” approach with China over the territory, by engaging in talks with US President Donald Trump to […]
When Rupert Wingfield-Hayes visited the Spratly Islands in the South China Sea, he found Chinese fishermen were deliberately destroying coral reefs. Poachers were revving the engines on their boats sending clouds of black diesel smoke pouring into the air – and under the water, were piles of shattered white coral branches. As he reports, some […]
We fly over Mischief Reef and am totally shocked at what we find. Over 70 boats are converting a pristine Atoll into an illegal Chinese Military base. This is Philippines territory, and so far away from China. It is against all international law.
Atolls begin as an underwater volcanoes called seamounts. Over time and many eruptions the seamount grows until it rises above the water and becomes an island. Corals grow around the island and, over geologic time, the volcano goes dormant and sinks, but the coral reefs remain and continue to grow faster than the island sinks, […]
China may be on the verge of making a major mistake that would undermine its great gains in soft power in Southeast Asia. This comes at a time when China needs friends in the region more than ever as its economy slows, trade tensions with the U.S. rise, and security and financial concerns with its […]
The waters of the South China Sea face environmental peril that is ‘inseparable from the territorial disputes that plague it’. As claimants solidify their positions through artificial island construction, with China driving the most ambitious builds, habitats with wide-ranging ecological and economic value are being destroyed. Calls for regional science-based cooperation to overcome these […]
As if the scandal over false claims about graduating from top universities is not enough for her, senatorial candidate Imee Marcos recently let loose with another jaw-dropping claim: It was the Philippines, she said in a TV interview, that started all the trouble with China by haling it before the international arbitral tribunal. It […]
MANILA, Philippines — Foreign Affairs Secretary Teodoro Locsin Jr. has assured the Filipinos that the government will “never abandon” the arbitral tribunal ruling which upheld the country’s exclusive sovereign rights over the West Philippine Sea. “We will never abandon the Hague decision nor concede an inch of the reefs taken from us. No and […]
Presidential spokesperson Salvador Panelo on Thursday slammed former Foreign Affairs Secretary Albert del Rosario, repeating his accusation that the former top diplomat was responsible for the loss of the country’s possession of the Scarborough Shoal. Del Rosario had earlier urged the Duterte administration to “unshelf” the arbitral tribunal ruling in 2016 that invalidated China’s excessive […]