What happens between China and the Philippines in the South China Sea

10 March 20222 years ago babelfish

All the news in the South China Sea. The article by Giuseppe Gagliano

The disputes over the resources of the South China Sea seem to never end.

Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte told his successor that Manila must honor an agreement his administration made with China to jointly explore an area in the disputed South China Sea for oil and gas deposits – or address possible conflicts.

This is the joint development agreement of Reed Bank, also known as Recto Bank, which falls in a disputed area of the South China Sea.

However, an international court ruling on Manila's unilateral challenge to Beijing's demands in 2016 stated that Reed Bank was considered part of the Philippine Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) and Continental Shelf, where Manila has exclusive sovereign rights.

However in November 2018, during the state visit of Chinese President Xi Jinping to Manila, both sides signed a "Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) on oil and gas development cooperation between the Philippines and China".

They agreed to set up committees to figure out how to conduct joint oil and gas exploration without having to address the issue of sovereignty. Both sides have committed to meet a deadline for signing a cooperation agreement by November 2019, but this has not happened.

Over the past year, however, Manila has become a more outspoken challenger to Beijing's assertiveness in disputed waters, filing numerous diplomatic protests against Chinese ships that have invaded its EEZ over the past three years.

Beijing claims nearly all of the South China Sea, and this is opposed by the Philippines, Malaysia, Brunei, Vietnam and Taiwan.

This is a machine translation from Italian language of a post published on Start Magazine at the URL https://www.startmag.it/mondo/cina-filippine-mar-cinese-meridionale/ on Thu, 10 Mar 2022 06:54:34 +0000.