MANILA: The Philippines will not remove a dilapidated navy ship grounded on an atoll in the South China Sea, its defense chief said on Thursday, rejecting a demand by China after it blocked a mission to resupply the vessel’s crew.
Defense Secretary Delfin Lorenzana dismissed China’s assertion on Wednesday that the Philippines had committed to remove the BRP Sierra Madre, which was intentionally grounded at the Second Thomas shoal in 1999 to reinforce Manila’s sovereignty claims in the Spratly archipelago.
The 100 meter-long tank landing ship was built for the US Navy during World War Two.
“That ship has been there since 1999. If there was commitment it would have been removed a long time ago,” Lorenzana told reporters.
Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian on Wednesday said Beijing “demands the Philippine side honor its commitment and remove its illegally grounded vessel.”
The Second Thomas Shoal, 195km off Palawan, is the temporary home of a small contingent of military aboard the rusty ship, which is stuck on a reef.
Lorenzana accused China of “trespassing” when its coast guard interrupted a resupply mission for the troops.
China claims the majority of the South China Sea as its own, using a “nine-dash line” on maps that an international arbitration ruling in 2016 said has no legal basis.
The Second Thomas Shoal is within the Philippines’ 200 nautical mile exclusive economic zone, as outlined in the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS), to which China is a signatory.
“We have two documents attesting that we have sovereign rights in our EEZ while they don’t, and their claims have no basis,” Lorenzana said.
“China should abide by its international obligations that it is part of.”
President Rodrigo Duterte on Monday told a summit hosted by Chinese President Xi Jinping that he “abhors” China’s recent actions at the shoal.
Philippines rejects China’s demand to remove grounded navy ship
https://arab.news/p996e
Philippines rejects China’s demand to remove grounded navy ship
- Defense Secretary Delfin Lorenzana dismisses China’s assertion that the Philippines had committed to remove the BRP Sierra Madre
EU assembly weighs freezing US trade deal over Trump’s Greenland threats
- Signatories were mainly fellow members of Clausen’s Left Group, but also included center-left Social Democrats and Greens
- Greens lawmaker Anna Cavazzini said the only argument in favor of the deal was to bring stability
BRUSSELS: The European Parliament is considering putting on hold the European Union’s implementation of the trade deal struck with the United States in protest over threats by US President Donald Trump to seize Greenland.
The European Parliament has been debating legislative proposals to remove many of the EU’s import duties on US goods — the bulk of the trade deal with the US — and to continue zero duties for US lobsters, initially agreed with Trump in 2020.
It was due to set its position in votes on January 26-27, which the MEPs said should now be postponed.
Leading members of the cross-parliamentary trade committee met to discuss the issue on Wednesday morning and decide whether to postpone the vote. In the end, they took no decision and settled on reconvening next week.
A parliamentary source said left-leaning and centrist groups favored taking action, such as a postponement.
A group of 23 lawmakers also urged the EU assembly’s president Roberta Metsola on Wednesday to freeze work on the agreement as long as the US administration continued its threats to take control of Greenland, an autonomous territory of Denmark.
“If we go through and approve a deal that Trump has seen as a personal victory, while he makes claims for Greenland and refuses to rule out any manner in which to achieve this, it will be easily seen as rewarding him and his actions,” the letter drafted by Danish lawmaker Per Clausen said.
Signatories were mainly fellow members of Clausen’s Left Group, but also included center-left Social Democrats and Greens.
Greens lawmaker Anna Cavazzini said the only argument in favor of the deal was to bring stability.
“Trump’s actions show again and again that chaos is his only offer,” she said.
French lawmaker Valerie Hayer, head of the centrist Renew Europe group, said on Tuesday the EU should consider holding off a vote if Trump’s threats continued.
Many lawmakers have complained that the US trade deal is lopsided, with the EU required to cut most import duties while the US sticks to a broad rate of 15 percent.
However, freezing the deal risks angering Trump, which could lead to higher US tariffs. The Trump administration has also ruled out any concessions, such as cutting tariffs on spirits or steel, until the deal is in place.
