While China was protesting the draping of the Philippine flag on the coffin Senior Police Inspector Rolando Mendoza, who hostaged a bus-full of tourists from Hongkong last Monday at the Rizal Park which resulted in the death of eight of the visitors, it was also doing its own flag- raising operation.
Foreign news agencies reported last Friday that China “had used a small, manned submarine to plant the national flag deep beneath the South China Sea, where Beijing has tussled with Washington and Southeast Asian nations over territorial disputes.”
What is the Philippines going to do now, being one of the countries that claim some parts of the South China Sea?
The Reuters report said “The submarine achieved the feat during 17 dives from May to last month, when it went as deep as 3,759m below the South China Sea, China News Service said, citing the Ministry of Science and Technology and State Oceanic Administration.”
Reuters also said “Chinese news reports did not say where the submarine went, whether it visited disputed waters, or why the announcement was held off until now. It was the first time a Chinese submersible vehicle has gone that deep, the reports said.”
Reuters reported that Liu Feng, the engineer in charge of the deep-sea dive, said in a TV interview “This success also shows that our country has become one of the handful possessing deep-sea manned submersible technology.”
The submarine test, Reuters said, underscored China’s ambitions to join the race for resources in the ocean depths.
The South China Sea covers an area of more than 1.7 million square kilometers, with more than 200 mostly uninhabitable islets, rocks and reefs. The sea holds valuable fishing grounds and as-yet largely unexploited oil and natural gas fields.
China claims the whole South China Sea while the Philippines, Vietnam, Taiwan, Malaysia, and Brunei, claims part of the 1.7 square kilometer area with more than 160 mostly unhabitable islets and reefs. Studies show the area to rich in natural resource including an estimated 200 billion barrels of oil.
South China Sea has been a scene of skirmishes among claimant countries. In 1999, the Philippines discovered too late that China had built structures in Mischief reef which it also claims. China also occupied the Paracels after a 1974 conflict with Vietnam.
Last July, China vehemently objected to the statement of U.S. State Secretary Hillary Clinton made at the Asean Regional Forum in Hanoi that “The United States has a national interest in freedom of navigation, open access to Asia’s maritime commons and respect for international law in the South China Sea,” and supports “a collaborative diplomatic process by all claimants for resolving the various territorial disputes without coercion.”
China’s Foreign Ministry said Clinton’s statement was “virtually an attack on China” and that U.S meddling on the regional issue would “only make matters worse and more difficult to solve.”
At the meeting of the 10-country Asean plus six of its dialogue partners in Hanoi in October which Aquino will attend, one of the topics to be discussed will be the proposed Code of Conduct in the South China Sea.
Wait, there’s more!: Buy her a gift this Valentines! or send her flowers!
