The Philippines said Tuesday it would remain indefinitely in a South China Sea shoal within its exclusive economic zone to ensure that Beijing does not engage there in building-related activities.
Rear Adm. Roy Vincent Trinidad, Philippine Navy spokesman for the West Philippine Sea, said the military branch had deployed a ship near Sabina Shoal to monitor the presence of Chinese vessels that have congregated near the area. The West Philippine Sea is Manila’s name for South China Sea waters inside its Exclusive Economic Zone, or EEZ.
Sabina Shoal is a reef in the Spratly Islands that lies within the Philippine EEZ. China calls the shoal Xiabin Reef, while the Philippines refers to it as Sabina Shoal.
An EEZ gives a coastal state exclusive rights to regulate fishing activities, explore and exploit natural resources within the zone’s waters, seabed and subsoil, according to the U.N. Convention on the Law of the Sea, or UNCLOS.
Trinidad said the Navy had monitored an “unusual pile up of crushed corals” in the area, forcing the Philippine Coast Guard to send a ship to monitor activities there. He said the Chinese side was being guarded by China Coast Guard vessel 5901, which experts have described as a 12,000-ton “monster ship.”
“It has been there since 30 July, until this morning, so we’re watching them [and] they are watching us,” Trinidad told a press forum on the West Philippine Sea.
“We have increased [our] presence in Sabina Shoal or Escoda just to ensure that there is no man-made facility to pile up crushed corals on the shoal,” he said, adding that a Chinese research and survey vessel, Ke Xue San Hao, had been tracked sailing and passing through Sabina Shoal. “We have informed appropriate government agencies about this.”
“It has been crisscrossing the area,” the past week and a half, Trinidad said, adding that Philippine Coast Guard vessels backed by the Navy would stay in the area on a rotating basis as long as the Chinese were also there.
The Chinese Embassy in Manila did not immediately respond to queries for comment. But on Sunday, it accused the Philippines of illegally stranding several vessels in the area, including a coast guard ship.
Trinidad maintained that the situation “is not a standoff” similar to what happened on Scarborough Shoal, which is also within Manila’s South China Sea territory, but which China has effectively occupied since 2012.
The Philippines took China to an international court of arbitration over the incident and in 2016 the body ruled in favor of the Southeast Asian country. China, however, has refused to recognize the ruling, and maintains that it owns nearly all of the South China Sea, including in waters that reach the shores of its neighbors.
Trinidad said China had reclaimed “roughly around 3,000 hectares” in the South China Sea, including Philippine waters. He said the areas that Beijing now controls were already militarized.
“They have airstrips. They have harbors for warships. There are structures on land that we can only surmise are aircraft hangars. They have military-grade communications equipment,” he said.
BenarNews is an RFA-affiliated online news organization.