Beijing holds South China Sea war games

The China Central Television, which aired video showing ships launching missiles and torpedoes, submarines surfacing in the water and fighter jets in formation releasing flares, said the drills end on Monday.

Stratbase ADRi trustee and now International Criminal Court Judge Raul Pangalangan said earlier that filing the case was a game changer for the Philippines, which would have been at a disadvantage in a bilateral setup.

Chinese warships, fighter jets and submarines held live-fire war games in the South China Sea, state media reported Saturday, just days ahead of an global tribunal’s ruling on a challenge to Beijing’s expansive claims in the waters.

The verdict of an global tribunal on a dispute with the Philippines over the strategic waters would be delivered on July 12.

In 2013, the Philippines unilaterally initiated an arbitration on the relevant disputes between China and the Philippines in the South China Sea, ignoring the common understanding the two countries had reached on solving the disputes through negotiations, and its commitments under the Declaration on the Conduct of Parties in the South China Sea.

China is firm about its territorial sovereignty and will not accept solutions offered by a third party after enduring abuse and humiliation by Western powers during its history, he said.

The nation has repeatedly declared that it does not consider the ruling of the arbitration court as legally binding.

A lot of people were understandably irked by Yasay’s statement, after China’s abrasive claims and unnecessarily violent approach in patrolling the disputed area.

“This is an example we would encourage China to follow”, the top Pentagon official said.

President Duterte said on Thursday he expected the ruling to be in favor of the Philippines and, if it is, he was willing to talk with China about joint exploration of resources in the West Philippine Sea.

“We can even have the objective of seeing how we can jointly explore this territory-how we can utilize and benefit mutually from the utilization of the resources in this exclusive economic zone [EEZ] where claims are overlapping”, Yasay said.

Yasay issued a rejoinder on Saturday to elaborate his statement.

He added, “To paraphrase another world leader, let me say that we do not fear to negotiate, and we do not negotiate out of fear”.