JAKARTA—US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton encourages the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) to present a united front to China in dealing with territorial disputes in the West Philippine Sea (South China Sea).
Clinton was in Jakarta to offer strong US support for a regionally endorsed plan to ease rising tensions by implementing a code of conduct for all claimants to disputed islands in the West Philippine Sea.
Jakarta is the headquarters of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations and Clinton also asked the group to insist that China agree to a formal mechanism to reduce short-term risks of conflict and ultimately come to final settlements over sovereignty.
“The most important thing is that we end up in a diplomatic process where these issues are addressed in a strong diplomatic conversation between a unified Asean and China rather than through any kind of coercion,” Clinton said.
The US Secretary of State, who made a refuelling stop in Brisbane on her way from a South Pacific summit in the Cook Islands, headed for China for talks on the often uneasy relationship between the world’s two largest economies.
The Philippines and Vietnam have both accused China of an intimidation campaign over territorial disputes in the West Philippine Sea, a waterway through which half of the world’s cargo sails.
Territorial disputes
The Philippines, Vietnam, Malaysia, Brunei and Taiwan claim parts of the sea that are within their exclusive economic zones. Islands, reefs and atolls in those areas are believed to be sitting on vast oil and gas deposits. China claims sovereignty over the entire sea, but refuses to bring its dispute with the other claimants to an international court for arbitration.
But the Philippines, which figured in a two-month maritime standoff with China at Scarborough Shoal in the West Philippine Sea, is going ahead and bringing its case to the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea (Itlos) with or without China.
The United States recently issued an unusually strong warning to China after Beijing angered Southeast Asian nations by establishing a remote garrison on Woody Island, in the Paracel chain in the West Philippine Sea. China accused Clinton of seeking to “contain” its rise.
(Source: Associated Press)