China has admitted carrying out reclamation and dredging activities in the South China, Beijing’s foreign ministry said on Monday, Nov. 20 2023, Ministry spokesperson Mao Ning issued the statement, President Marcos’ pronouncements at a forum in Hawaii that China’s military facilities on reclaimed features have come dangerously near the Philippine coastlines.
China is carrying out construction activities even though it is contested and not on its own territory. During a question and answer session in the Daniel Inouye Speaker Series at the Asia-Pacific Center for Security Studies in Honolulu, Hawaii over the weekend, Marcos also said the Philippines is negotiating a separate code of conduct in the South China Sea with Vietnam and Malaysia, citing the “slow progress” in the forging of a COC between ASEAN and China.
“We are now in the midst of negotiating our own code of conduct, for example, with Vietnam because we are still waiting for the code of conduct between China and ASEAN and the progress has been rather slow unfortunately,” Marcos said. And so we’ve taken the initiative to approach those other countries around ASEAN with whom we have existing territorial conflicts,” he said.
Mao was referring to the 2002 Declaration on the Conduct of Parties in the South China Sea or DOC, which does not provide sanctions and has failed to stop Chinese aggression in the West Philippine Sea. “Formulating a Code of Conduct in the South China Sea (COC) is an important task for China and ASEAN countries to implement the Declaration on the Conduct of Parties in the South China Sea (DOC),” Mao said. The Philippines, Vietnam and Malaysia also claim part or parts of the South China Sea, believed to have large reserves of oil and gas.
According to President Marcos, “to make our own code of conduct and hopefully this will grow further in the extent into the other ASEAN countries and at the very least we have that basis between not only in the multilateral sphere as in ASEAN or APEC, all of these other organizations but also bilaterally with the different countries around ASEAN whom we have conflicts with, but with whom, I think, we can find a way to maintain the status quo.”
PBBM said the COC’s primary purpose is to maintain peace in the region. Since 2002, ASEAN has sought to obtain China’s consent to a binding COC in the West Philippine Sea (WPS)
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