Lorenzana: PHL concerned if China’s huge dredger deployed in West PHL Sea

It will be a cause for concern for the Philippines if China will send its largest dredging vessel to the West Philippine Sea, Defense Secretary Delfin Lorenzana said on Monday.

Lorenzana said the department of National Defense was monitoring the movement of the Tian Kun Hao.

“We have reports that they launched their big dredger but we don’t know where it is going. We are constantly monitoring the movement of this ship,” Lorenzana told reporters after the 78th DND anniversary.

“Now wala pa masyado siguro because wala pa naman ginagawa yung dredger na yan, where it is going, what will it do, we do not know. But the mere presence is a little bit concerning, yes,” he added.

Lorenzana said that all the islands being claimed and occupied by the Philippines are were now under heightened alert.

The West Philippine Sea is the part of the South China Sea being claimed by the Philippines.

“We have security there in Pagasa (island), meron tayong mga tropa doon and all the islands that we occupy so we will know immediately kung meron silang mga ginagawa sa mga island natin,” Lorenzana said.

He added the military was conducting regular patrols in the area.

“We have our ships going there, we have also our aerial patrol going regularly so we will be able to monitor the movement of this so-called very big dredger ship,” Lorenzana said.

Tian Kun Hao, measuring 140 meters long and 28 meters wide, has begun its water tests at the coastal province of Jiangsu.

It was reported to have a deck the size of nine basketball courts capable of dredging up to 6,000 cubic meters an hour and can dig as deep as 35 meters under the sea floor.

It replaces Tian Jing Hao as Asia's largest dredging vessel.

Tian Jing Hao was reported to have been extensively used in building artificial islands in the South China Sea.

The Philippines, China, Malaysia, Vietnam, Brunei, and Taiwan are claiming in part or in whole the Spratly Islands which is believed to be rich in oil and minerals.

International meetings

The testing of the dredger comes ahead of two major international meetings in Vietnam and the Philippines this week and the next, set to be attended by China and the United States.

In August, the foreign ministers of Southeast Asia and China adopted a negotiating framework for a code of conduct in the South China Sea, a move they hailed as progress but which critics saw as a tactic to buy China time to consolidate its maritime power.

All parties say the framework is only an outline for how the code will be established, but critics say the failure to outline as an initial objective the need to make the code legally binding and enforceable, or have a dispute resolution mechanism, raises doubts about how effective it will be.

In Beijing, Chinese Assistant Foreign Minister Chen Xiaodong said talks on the framework had achieved important progress and there would be results at the Manila summit of Southeast Asian nations, attended by Chinese Premier Li Keqiang.

"Whether the code is binding, or how it would be binding, and what the code looks like in its final form, depends on the outcome of the talks between China and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations," Chen told reporters.

"It can't be decided by a single party."

Chinese President Xi Jinping will attend the other meeting, of Asia-Pacific leaders in Vietnam. —NB, GMA News