Marcos says Philippines has no territorial conflict with China

President Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr. has asserted the country’s sovereignty in the West Philippine Sea as he said that Philippines and China have no “territorial conflict,” but only Beijing is claiming what is part of the country’s territory.

“The position that the Philippines takes is that we have no territorial conflict with China. What we have [is] China claiming territory that belongs to the Philippines,” Marcos said in an interview with former Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd, who hosted the President’s meeting with the Asia Society in New York on Saturday morning (Philippine time).

“This is the position we take, and with our American partners, we have promoted that position. We have also made it clear to our friends in Beijing that this is the way we feel about it,” he said.

The Philippines and China have been in a long-standing maritime dispute as Beijing claims almost the entirety of South China Sea, which overlaps with the West Philippine Sea.

The Philippines scored a victory against China in the Permanent Court of Arbitration in The Hague, Netherlands in 2016. The arbitration court declared Beijing’s claim over nearly the entire South China Sea as illegal.

But China refused to recognize the 2016 arbitral ruling.

Marcos, nonetheless, said that the Philippine “will continue to work with China and other claimant states with the end in view of solving the issues involving the West Philippine Sea through diplomacy and through dialogue.” 

The President said that the issue of overlapping territorial claims in the West Philippines has become “an issue right at the gut of our people,” pointing out that “our fishermen are not allowed to continue with their livelihoods to fish in areas where they have fished for the past 30, 40 generations.”

“[T]his diplomatic, this territorial challenge that we have, I would like to point out that this is the first national election in the Philippines where foreign policy was an issue with the people,” Marcos said.

The President said that the Philippines will continue to engage China on people to people, economic relationships, and cultural exchanges.

He said that the “differences” between Manila and Beijing concerning maritime claims should not be “the defining element of our relationship.”

In an interview with reporters in New York, Marcos said he did not want to compare his approach to resolving the maritime dispute to that of his predecessor, Rodrigo Duterte.

"I don’t want to compare me and PRRD (Duterte). He did it because that’s what he felt was the way to do it," Marcos said.

Duterte's decision to temporarily set aside the country's arbitration victory in the South China Sea dispute improved Manila's economic and diplomatic relations with Beijing, but enraged critics who accused him of kowtowing to China.

However, Duterte declared before the United Nations General Assembly in September 2020 that the ruling against China's excessive maritime claims is "beyond compromise and beyond the reach of passing governments to dilute, diminish, or abandon." He rejected attempts to undermine the ruling of the Permanent Court of Arbitration.

"We have been consistent and we continue to toe that line that our foreign policy, the main principle behind all that we do [is] two things: peace and the national interest. And we will continue to hew to that idea and to those principles," Marcos said.

Marcos is on a six-day working visit to the US. The highlight of his trip was his speech during the 77th session of the United Nations General Assembly. He also met with US President Joe Biden. —KG/VBL, GMA News