China eases off Philippine fishing boats in overture to incoming president Duterte
Coastguard has scaled back interception of Filipino fishermen in disputed waters near the Scarborough Shoal
China’s coastguard has scaled back interception of Filipino fishermen in disputed waters near the Scarborough Shoal in an apparent friendly gesture toPhilippine president-elect Rodrigo Duterte, according to a Philippines defence adviser and a source close to the Chinese navy.
Philippine boats had returned to fish near the shoal in the last three weeks without being apprehended by Chinese vessels, said Professor Rommel Banlaoi, director of the Centre for Intelligence and National Security Studies, a non-government research group in the Philippines.
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The shoal is 230km off the coast of the Philippines and claimed by Manila, Beijing and Taipei.
“[It is] one indication of the positive signs going on,” Banlaoi said on the weekend on the sidelines of the Shangri-La Dialogue, a regional security forum.
He said that another “good sign” was the Philippine navy had been able to conduct patrols near the Manila-controlled Second Thomas Shoal, which is also claimed by Beijing, without harassment from the China Coast Guard. “The incoming president [also] met the Chinese ambassador to Manila,” he said.
Beijing is increasingly assertive in making territorial claims in the South China Sea, prompting US Defence Secretary Ash Carter to accuse China of “erecting a Great Wall of self-isolation”.