The United States condemned China’s aggression as it sought to prevent U.S. defense treaty partner the Philippines from resupplying an outlying military outpost in contested waters Tuesday.
“The United States stands with our ally the Philippines following the People’s Republic of China’s (PRC) provocative actions against lawful Philippine maritime operations in the South China Sea,” U.S. State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller said in a statement.
China claims most of the resource-rich waterway as its territory, including areas within the exclusive economic zones of nearby countries like the Philippines, citing unspecified historical rights. Over the past year, Chinese maritime forces have resorted to unsafe maneuvering and deployed water cannons in an effort to head off Philippine supply convoys en route to Second Thomas Shoal.
These increasingly tense episodes have widened the rift between the neighbors and raised concerns a miscalculation could draw Washington into a conflict with nuclear-armed Beijing.
Footage released by both the Philippines and China on Tuesday revealed minor collisions, with each blaming the other.
Video also emerged showing the China Coast Guard’s heavy use of its water cannons, which damaged on Philippine supply boat to the point it had to be escorted back to port. Manila said four crew members were injured when a water blast shattered the windshield of the vessel.
“The PRC’s actions again show disregard for the safety and livelihoods of Filipinos and international law,” Miller said.
An international tribunal’s ruling in 2016 largely dismissed China’s wide-ranging territorial claims over the resource-rich waterway, citing the 1982 United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) to which both Beijing and Manila are signatories.
Miller reaffirmed that the U.S.’s 73-year-old defense pact with its Southeast Asian ally extends to Philippine assets “anywhere in the South China Sea.”
Calling the China Coast Guard’s actions “justified, lawful, professional, restrained, and beyond reproach,” the Chinese embassy in Manila wrote: “The U.S. Department of State who disregards the fact and confuses right with wrong has made baseless attacks against China’s legitimate and lawful actions to safeguard our rights.”
Jam Sta Rosa/AFP via Getty Images
The embassy accused the U.S. of threatening China, “emboldening” the Philippines, and endorsing the ally’s “acts of infringement and arbitration.”
The Chinese embassy in Manila didn’t immediately respond to Newsweek’s request for comment.
A number of other countries also expressed alarm over Tuesday’s confrontation, with the Japanese, South Korea, Swedish, German, French, and Canadian missions in the Philippines calling for peaceful dispute resolution and adherence to UNCLOS.
“The United Kingdom condemns today’s unsafe actions by Chinese vessels against the Philippines in Second Thomas Shoal, which resulted in Philippine injuries, British Ambassador Laure Beaufils wrote in a statement on X, formerly Twitter.
Meanwhile, New Zealand’s embassy wrote it was “deeply concerned at dangerous actions today by Chinese vessels towards the Philippines at Second Thomas Shoal. Water cannons and contact by vessels threaten life at sea. Peaceful resolution of maritime disputes in accordance with UNCLOS is fundamental to regional stability.”
Uncommon Knowledge
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Newsweek is committed to challenging conventional wisdom and finding connections in the search for common ground.