Opinion: Duterte seeks to play dealmaker in South China Sea disputes
The brash Philippine leader likely will use his chairmanship of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations to wrest concessions from China during this month’s meeting with China’s president
The Philippines’ controversial leader, Rodrigo Duterte, got his first crack at global leadership by chairing the recently concluded Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean) summit in Manila late last month.
During the three-day mega-event, the Filipino president suavely hosted his fellow Southeast Asian leaders, who came to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the regional body’s founding. Southeast Asian leaders discussed a range of key challenges facing the region, from terrorism to transnational crime and territorial disputes in the South China Sea.
Duterte wasted no chance to use his rotational chairmanship of the Asean to defend his controversial war on drugs, which has come under heavy criticism from Western powers and international media.
“[R]elations [with Dialogue Partners] can be made more productive and constructive if the valued principle of non-interference in the internal affairs of Asean Member States is observed,” he said. The remarks were aimed, unmistakably, at foreign powers that have been critical of Duterte’s human rights record.
This emerging transactional approach is part of Duterte’s ‘art of the deal’ vis-à-vis the South China Sea disputes.
Standing before a largely sympathetic audience composed mostly of autocratic leaders with sketchy human rights records, the Filipino president called upon Western powers to “learn to respect” Asean nations and treat them as “sovereign equals”.