The Philippines on Tuesday said it had conducted “a special operation” to remove a 300-meter floating barrier installed by China in a flash point area of the contested South China Sea, just 230 kilometers (140 miles) from the Philippine coast.
The incident — which prevented Filipino fishers from entering the shoal, where the catch can be more abundant — was the latest in a series of rows over the strategic waterway that have seen bilateral ties between the two Asian nations plummet.
Video posted to social media by a Philippine Coast Guard spokesman showed divers cutting the rope-and-buoy barrier and hauling away its anchor outside the entrance to Scarborough Shoal on Monday, after their Chinese counterparts installed the barrier over the weekend.
The removal went off without a hitch, spokesman Commodore Jay Tarriela told local media, with the Philippine vessel coming the closest to Scarborough Shoal since Beijing seized control of it from Manila in 2012.
China effectively administers the rocky outcroppings — which lie within Manila’s exclusive economic zone — though the Philippines and Taiwan also claim the shoal.
Speaking at a budget briefing at the Senate on Tuesday, Philippine Foreign Secretary Enrique Manalo said the barrier’s removal was within his countries’ rights.
"Our aim is to manage disputes peacefully and through the rule of law and international law," local media quoted Manalo as saying.
The Foreign Ministry in Beijing on Tuesday warning the Philippines "not to stir up trouble" over the incident.
China claims "indisputable sovereignty” over the area, and has alleged that a Philippine fisheries bureau vessel had attempted Friday to enter the area “without China’s permission,” leading to the barrier’s installation.
"The China Coast Guard did what was necessary to block and drive away the Philippine vessel,” Foreign Ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin said Monday. “The steps it took were professional and restrained.”
In an editorial late Monday, China’s state-run Global Times newspaper slammed the Philippine moves, calling them “premeditated” and claiming that Philippine government vessels nearby had been carrying Western journalists with cameras and other equipment for on-site filming — part of an attempt at “hype by the Philippine side in collaboration with Western media.”
The latest moves followed reports of "provocative acts" by Beijing in the South China Sea, including Chinese vessels venturing dangerously close and firing water cannons at Philippine government ships in recent months. In February, Manila alleged that a China Coast Guard ship had used a "military-grade laser" against their Philippine counterparts, temporarily blinding its crew on the bridge.
Under its so-called nine-dash line, Beijing maintains a claim to some 90% of the South China Sea, through which trillions of dollars in trade flow every year — a position that flies in the face of a July 2016 ruling by the Permanent Court of Arbitration in The Hague invalidating most of those claims.
Beijing does not recognize the ruling, calling it “a piece of waste paper.”
China has conducted a massive land-reclamation project to essentially build and militarize a number of islands in the waters, despite protests from other claimants, as well as the United States and Japan. Washington and Tokyo fear that the Chinese-held outposts, some of which boast military-grade airfields and advanced weaponry, could be used to restrict free movement in an area that includes vital sea lanes.
But experts say seizing Scarborough Shoal and reclaiming land there, in particular, would be the crowning jewel for China as it seeks to solidify an iron grip over the South China Sea.
Building at Scarborough would create a large strategic triangle comprising Woody Island in the Paracel chain farther north and its nearby Spratly Island outposts in the waterway, giving Beijing the ability to police an air defense identification zone in the South China Sea.
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