Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, November 22) — President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. recently met with his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping who said he wants the West Philippine Sea issue resolved by the militaries of the two claimant countries, Philippine Ambassador to the United States Jose ‘Babe’ Manuel Romualdez said on Wednesday.
The two leaders met on the sidelines of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) Summit in San Francisco last week. Marcos said he discussed with Xi his concerns over the ongoing tensions in the West Philippine Sea and to hopefully find ways to prevent conflict in the area.
Speaking to CNN Philippines’ The Source, Romualdez said Marcos was clear on his intention to find a solution to lower the tensions.
“But I think in the end President Xi just simply said that we should just keep talking about it and from the read out I saw from our report is that President Xi said that let’s just have our military talk about all these things, our militaries to resolve these things in the West Philippine Sea,” he added.
Following this meeting, Foreign Ministry spokesperson Mao Ning said Tuesday that “China carrying out construction activities on its own territory is a matter purely within the scope of China’s sovereignty and other countries have no right to point fingers at it.” This was her response when asked about Marcos saying Beijing’s military bases in the West Philippine sea are now closer to the Philippines’ coastline.
Romualdez said Xi’s statement is not encouraging at all.
The developments also show there is conflict and that there is “no real clear sign that they’re going to be letting up any of these things that is happening,” the envoy said, referring to China.
“It goes to show there is really a disconnect in everything,” he added.
