Philippine sinologist Aileen Baviera, dead from coronavirus, had urged recognition of China’s complexity

Academics across Asia have paid tribute to Dr Aileen Baviera, expressing their grief after the well-known Filipino expert on China-Southeast Asia relations died on March 21 from severe pneumonia caused by Covid-19.

Baviera, 60, reportedly contracted the novel coronavirus while attending the First Indo-Pacific Conference at the Ecole Militaire in Paris from March 4 to 11. She arrived in Manila on March 12 and immediately checked herself into Manila’s San Lazaro Hospital, where she remained until her death.

A fellow conference attendee, Dr Alan Ortiz, president of the Philippine Council for Foreign Relations, died in Paris on March 23, according to a Facebook post by his daughter.

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“The shocking news [of Baviera’s death] caused deep grief to me,” wrote Qi Huaigao, vice dean of the Institute of International Studies at Fudan University, Shanghai, in a post on the University of the Philippines’ Asian Centre website.

“She knew China very well and had been to many places in China, including border areas such as Xinjiang, Inner Mongolia, and Heilongjiang,” wrote Qi, who recalled meeting her at the university in 2010.

In 2016, they met again during a forum in Fudan where Baviera “suggested China and the Philippines could make joint development and joint conservation possible by setting aside sovereignty disputes”, Qi said, adding that her suggestion proved “farsighted” as evinced by discussions between the two countries during the administration of Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte.

He said young scholars from China and the Philippines should always remember the contents of an essay Baviera wrote last year, in which she advised them to “seek truth from facts in the subject of their study” and “try to maintain objectivity at all times, which can be quite difficult given the state of ties today”.

She also counselled young academics to “recognise the complexity and multiple facets of China”, in which 1.4 billion people are “thinking, breathing, living”.

“Her suggestion is also inspiring for Chinese young scholars [looking] to conduct research on the Philippines,” Qi said.

While Baviera wrote that “if one has to take a side, one must take the side of the Filipino people”, Qi said this inspired him as well. “Being a young Chinese scholar on international relations, I will be always committed to the Chinese people.”

Professor Hidetoshi Nishimura, president of the Economic Research Institute of Asean and East Asia, called Baviera a “great scholar … her work was brilliant and it will be impossible to replace her. I am deeply grieved to learn of her death.”

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In a statement, the University of Malaya’s Asia-Europe Institute called Baviera’s death “a great loss to the academic world at large”.

The Philippines’ ambassador to China, Jose Santiago “Chito” Sta Romana, had known Baviera for decades. On Facebook, he wrote: “Farewell and rest in peace, my dear friend and beloved colleague! I will always cherish your collegial advice, objective analysis and scholarly wisdom!”

In a digital memorial set up for Baviera, maritime law expert Jay Batongbacal recalled that in 2013 a group of experts on Sino-Philippine relations had gone to China to try to engage their counterparts there following the filing of an arbitration complaint against China by the Philippines over Beijing’s incursions in the South China Sea.

Their numbers included Sta Romana, who later took up his ambassadorial position, and Rear Admiral Giovanni Carlo Bacordo, who is now the fleet commander of the Philippine Navy.

“How about us?,” Batongbacal asked her. Baviera’s response was simple, he recalled: “I am going to retire happy. I don’t know what you plan to do.”

Wrote Batongbacal: “I plan to retire happy too, Aileen. We who remain, we’ll get through this, and when this lockdown is over, we’ll get together and have an Irish wake for you. Thank you for having been part of our lives.”

Political risk analyst Ramon Casiple also mourned her death. “Rest in peace, Aileen, and say hello to Jorge,” he said, referring to Baviera’s husband, who died in 2018.