‘Never a promise’: did Philippines ever agree to tow away grounded warship in South China Sea?

Name: Philippines accuses Chinese coastguard of firing water cannons at its vessels in disputed waters
Uploaded: 2023-08-19T01:30:07.000Z
Duration: 2 min 13 s
Description: Philippines accuses Chinese coastguard of firing water cannons at its vessels in disputed waters

China says Manila reneged on its promise to remove the BRP Sierra Madre from Second Thomas Shoal, but a former Philippine defence chief disagrees

His comments suggest a degree of word play to keep the Chinese at bay, in an apparent tit-for-tat at China’s seizure of Mischief Reef in 1995

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A Philippine flag flutters from BRP Sierra Madre, a dilapidated Philippine Navy ship that has been aground since 1999 on the disputed Second Thomas Shoal in the South China Sea. File photo: Reuters

Raissa Robles

Published: 9:30am, 19 Aug 2023Updated: 4:03pm, 13 Oct 2023

In November 1999, five months after the now-infamous Philippine naval vessel BRP Sierra Madre was intentionally run aground at Second Thomas Shoal in the disputed South China Sea, Manila ran aground another naval ship, the BRP Benguet – this time on Scarborough Shoal.

Orlando Mercado, the defence secretary at the time, told This Week in Asia that the Philippines’ then navy chief vice-admiral Luisito Fernandez had met him to say, “mission accomplished”.

Mercado said he then ordered Fernandez to “look for two or three more landing ship tanks” to beach on other shoals at the heart of the territorial and maritime dispute pitting China against five Southeast Asian nations.

From the Philippines’ point of view, this was one way for it to stop China’s “creeping invasion” of what was clearly Manila’s territorial waters under international convention. Mercado said Fernandez warned him that the Chinese were not that gullible. “Sir, the Chinese might not believe us,” Mercado quoted him as saying.

The circumstances behind the 1999 grounding of the Sierra Madre have come into sharp focus in recent weeks following the August 5 episode when Chinese actions – including the firing of water cannons – forced one of two Philippine boats resupplying personnel on the vessel to turn back.

The Philippines and several Western nations, including the United States, have slammed the Chinese actions as “dangerous”.

China in turn has said its coastguard – operating 1,000km from its nearest land mass, Hainan island – was “professional and restrained” and urged the Philippines to remove the vessel. It said Manila, which calls the shoal Ayungin, had reneged on multiple promises over the decades to do so.

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Philippines accuses Chinese coastguard of firing water cannons at its vessels in disputed waters