Manila summons Chinese envoy over navy ship’s ‘illegal incursion’ into Philippine waters

The Philippine government summoned Beijing’s ambassador Monday to explain the “illegal incursion” by a Chinese navy reconnaissance ship in the Sulu Sea, Manila’s foreign office said, in the latest maritime incident between the nations with competing South China Sea claims.

The Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) said it had called on Ambassador Huang Xilian to meet with Acting Undersecretary Theresa Lazaro over China’s alleged action in the southwestern area of the Philippine archipelago.

An “electronic reconnaissance ship” of the People’s Liberation Army Navy (PLAN) had entered Philippine waters without permission from Jan. 29 to Feb. 1, the department said in a statement that called the action “illegal.”

In its statement, the department did not say why it waited six weeks to confront the Chinese ambassador. Officials at the department did not immediately respond to follow-up requests from BenarNews seeking more information.

The Dongdiao-class PLAN ship communicated that it was “exercising innocent passage” when the Philippine Navy challenged it in Sulu Sea waters, the department said. The ship reached the Cuyo Islands in the Palawan region of the central Philippines.

“Its movements, however, did not follow a track that can be considered continuous and expeditious, lingering in the Sulu Sea for three days,” the DFA said, adding that the ship did not immediately leave despite being warned off by the Philippine Navy. 

On Monday, the department said Manila recognizes the right of any ship to pursue innocent passage through its waters in accordance with the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS). However, the action of the Chinese ship “did not constitute innocent passage and violated Philippines sovereignty.”

Lazaro reminded the Chinese government through its envoy to respect international law and to direct its ships to “desist from entering Philippine waters uninvited and without permission,” it said. 

The Chinese Embassy in Manila did not respond to BenarNews requests for comment. 

Nearly five years ago, bilateral relations were more positive as Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte hinted at a possible training exercise with China in the Sulu Sea. Duterte made the statement during a May 1, 2017, port call by Chinese warship Changchun in his hometown of Davao, PLAN’s first such visit in seven years.

For years, the Philippines and China meanwhile have been locked in a territorial row in the South China Sea, which is known to Filipinos as the West Philippine Sea.

In 2012, the Philippine Coast Guard engaged the Chinese in a stand-off over the Scarborough Shoal, a rich fishing ground that is well within the country’s exclusive economic zone in the South China Sea. China reneged on a deal to leave the region and its ships stayed put.

In 2013, Manila filed a case against Beijing and in a landmark verdict three years later, the International Court of Arbitration in The Hague ruled in favor of the Philippines and threw out China’s expansive territorial claims in the sea region.

China claims nearly all of the South China Sea as its own, but five other Asian governments – Brunei, Malaysia, the Philippines, Taiwan and Vietnam – have territorial claims. While Indonesia does not regard itself as a party to the South China Sea dispute, Beijing claims historic rights to parts of the sea overlapping Indonesia’s exclusive economic zone (EEZ). 

The Philippines occupies nine islands and areas in the South China Sea, the largest of which is Thitu, the island Filipinos call Pag-asa, where the military has been constructing an improved airstrip and port. 

Manila has been complaining about Beijing’s presence within its EEZ for about a year. It summoned Ambassador Huang after about 220 Chinese ships were spotted in March 2021 around Whitsun Reef in the Spratly Islands, a South China Sea chain contested by the two governments.