By Pia Lee-Brago
MANILA, Philippines - The Philippines will raise China’s construction of military facilities in the South China Sea during the bilateral consultation mechanism meeting in May, Foreign Affairs Secretary Enrique Manalo said yesterday.
This position will be adopted despite China’s assurances that the reports on building permanent structures on Panatag (Scarborough) shoal “are not official government plans” and that China has “no intention of doing that.”
In an interview on Isss, Manalo said China’s construction activities within the Philippine exclusive economic zone (EEZ) and the images released by the Washington-based CSIS Asia Maritime Transparency Initiative (AMTI) on these developments are taken by the Philippines “very seriously” and “we will have to seek clarification from China on what these are all about.”
“What is important is that we are constantly monitoring this and we are certainly not sleeping on this. The DFA in coordination with other security agencies is keeping a tight watch on developments,” Manalo added. “We will have to verify with China. It will be one of the issues. What is the intention of building this?”
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