MANILA: The Philippine defense chief said Tuesday that China is “the biggest disruptor” of peace in Southeast Asia and called for stronger international censure over its aggression in the South China Sea, a day after China blocked Philippine vessels from delivering food to a Coast Guard ship at the Sabina Shoal.
Defense Secretary Gilberto Teodoro Jr. spoke at an international military conference organized in Manila by the US Indo-Pacific Command amid a spike in clashes between China and the Philippines in the disputed South China Sea and in its airspace.
China is “the biggest disruptor of international peace” in Southeast Asia, Teodoro told the conference, which was attended by military officials and senior diplomats from the US and allied countries.
He later told reporters on the sidelines of the conference that international statements of concern against China’s increasingly assertive actions in the disputed waters and elsewhere were “not enough.”
“The antidote is a stronger collective multilateral action against China,” Teodoro said, adding that diplomats and defense officials should determine those stronger steps.
Pressed by reporters to be more specific, Teodoro said a UN Security Council resolution condemning and ordering a stop to Chinese acts of aggression would be a strong step but acknowledged the difficulty of pursuing that. “The world is not that perfect,” Teodoro said.
There was no immediate reaction from Chinese officials.
China, like its geopolitical rival the US, is one of the five permanent members of the UN Security Council and has power to veto such an adversarial step.
The Association of Southeast Asian Nations has paid “attention” to China’s aggressive actions but should do much more, Teodoro said. The 10-nation Southeast Asian bloc includes the Philippines, Vietnam, Malaysia and Brunei, which have South China Sea claims that overlap with each other, as well as China’s and Taiwan’s.
“ASEAN, to remain relevant and credible, cannot continue to ignore what China is doing in the South China Sea,” Teodoro said.
In the latest incident in the South China Sea, Philippine officials said China deployed “an excessive force” of 40 ships that blocked two Philippine vessels from delivering food and other supplies to Manila’s largest coast guard ship in the disputed Sabina Shoal in the latest flare-up of their territorial disputes in the busy sea passage.
China and the Philippines blamed each other for the confrontation on Monday in Sabina Shoal, an uninhabited atoll both countries claim that has become the latest flashpoint in the Spratlys, the most hotly disputed region of the sea passage that is a key global trade and security route.
China and the Philippines have separately deployed coast guard ships to Sabina in recent months on suspicion the other may act to take control of and build structures in the fishing atoll.
The hostilities have particularly intensified between China and the Philippines since last year and Monday’s confrontation was the sixth the two sides have reported in the high seas and in the air. The confrontations have sparked concerns of a larger conflict that could involved the United States, the longtime treaty ally of the Philippines.
Sabina is near the Second Thomas Shoal, another flashpoint where China has hampered the Philippine delivery of supplies for Filipino forces aboard a long-grounded navy ship, the BRP Sierra Madre. Last month, China and the Philippines reached an agreement to prevent increasingly hostile confrontations at the Second Thomas Shoal, allowing a Philippine vessel to deliver food supplies a week later without any hostilities.
The Philippine coast guard said Chinese coast guard and navy ships, along with 31 suspected militia vessels, illegally obstructed the delivery, which including an ice cream treat for the personnel aboard the BRP Teresa Magbanua as the Philippines marked National Heroes’ Day on Monday.
The Philippine coast guard said it “remains steadfast in our commitment to uphold national interests and ensure the safety and security of our waters” and urged “the China coast guard to abide with the international law and stop deploying maritime forces that could undermine mutual respect, a universally recognized foundation for responsible and friendly relations among coast guards.”
In Beijing, China’s coast guard said that it took control measures against two Philippine coast guard ships that “intruded” into waters near the Sabina Shoal. It said in a statement that the Philippine ships escalated the situation by repeatedly approaching a Chinese coast guard ship. The Chinese coast guard did not say what control measures it took.
China has rapidly expanded its military and has become increasingly assertive in pursuing its territorial claims in the South China Sea, which Beijing claims virtually in its entirety. The tensions have led to more frequent confrontations, primarily with the Philippines, though the longtime territorial disputes also involve other claimants, including Vietnam, Taiwan, Malaysia and Brunei.
Japan’s government also protested to Beijing on Tuesday, saying that a Chinese reconnaissance plane violated its airspace and forced it to scramble fighter jets.
Sabina Shoal lies about 140 kilometers west of the Philippine province of Palawan, in the internationally recognized exclusive economic zone of the Philippines.
Philippine defense chief says China is ‘the biggest disruptor’ of peace, seeks stronger censure
https://arab.news/ntjp9
Philippine defense chief says China is ‘the biggest disruptor’ of peace, seeks stronger censure
- Adds statements of concern against China’s increasingly assertive actions in the disputed waters and elsewhere were ‘not enough’
- ‘ASEAN, to remain relevant and credible, cannot continue to ignore what China is doing in the South China Sea’
UK pays Guantanamo detainee ‘substantial’ compensation over US torture questions
- Abu Zubaydah has been held at Guantanamo Bay without charge for 20 years
- British security services knew he was subjected to ‘enhanced interrogation’ but failed to raise concerns for 4 years
LONDON: A Saudi-born Palestinian being held without trial by the US has received a “substantial” compensation payment from the UK government, the BBC reported.
Abu Zubaydah has been imprisoned at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba for almost 20 years following his capture in Pakistan in 2002, and was subjected to “enhanced interrogation” techniques by the CIA.
He was accused of being a senior member of Al-Qaeda in the aftermath of the Sept. 11 terror attacks on the US. The allegations were later dropped but he remains in detention.
The compensation follows revelations that UK security services submitted questions to the US to be put to Abu Zubaydah by their US counterparts despite knowledge of his mistreatment.
He alleged that MI5 and MI6 had been “complicit” in torture, leading to a legal case and the subsequent compensation.
Dominic Grieve, the UK’s former attorney general, chaired a panel reviewing Abu Zubaydah’s case.
He described the compensation as “very unusual” but said the treatment of Abu Zubaydah had been “plainly” wrong, the BBC reported.
Grieve added that the security services had evidence that the “Americans were behaving in a way that should have given us cause for real concern,” and that “we (UK authorities) should have raised it with the US and, if necessary, closed down co-operation, but we failed to do that for a considerable period of time.”
Abu Zubaydah’s international legal counsel, Prof. Helen Duffy, said: “The compensation is important, it’s significant, but it’s insufficient.”
She added that more needs to be done to secure his release, stating: “These violations of his rights are not historic, they are ongoing.”
Duffy said Abu Zubaydah would continue to fight for his freedom, adding: “I am hopeful that the payment of the substantial sums will enable him to do that and to support himself when he’s in the outside world.”
He is one of 15 people still being held at Guantanamo, many without charge. Following his initial detention, he arrived at the prison camp having been the first person to be taken to a so-called CIA “black site.”
He spent time at six such locations, including in Lithuania and Poland, outside of US legal jurisdiction.
Internal MI6 messages revealed that the “enhanced interrogation” techniques he was subjected to would have “broken” the resolve of an estimated 98 percent of US special forces members had they been subjected to them.
CIA officers later decided he would be permanently cut off from the outside world, with then-President George W. Bush publicly saying Abu Zubaydah had been “plotting and planning murder.”
However, the US has since withdrawn the allegations and no longer says he was a member of Al-Qaeda.
A report by the US Senate Select Committee on Intelligence said Abu Zubaydah had been waterboarded at least 83 times, was locked in a coffin-like box for extended periods, and had been regularly assaulted. Much of his treatment would be considered torture under UK law.
Despite knowledge of his treatment, it was four years before British security services raised concerns with their American counterparts, and their submission of questions within that period had “created a market” for the torture of detainees, Duffy said.
A 2018 report by the UK Parliament’s Intelligence and Security Committee was deeply critical of the behavior of MI5 and MI6 in relation to Abu Zubaydah.
It also criticized conduct relating to Guantanamo detainee Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, widely regarded as a key architect of the Sept. 11 attacks, warning that the precedent set by Abu Zubaydah’s legal action could be used by Mohammed to bring a separate case against the UK.
MI5 and MI6 failed to comment on Abu Zubaydah’s case. Neither the UK government nor Mohammed’s legal team would comment on a possible case over his treatment.
