The Philippines said Monday it would “continuously deploy” coast guard vessels to the contested waters of Sabina Shoal in the South China Sea, denying it has given up on the reef a day after it withdrew a ship that had been stationed there amid a five-month standoff with China.
“The Philippine Coast Guard, together with the armed forces of the Philippines, will never abandon our sovereign rights over these waters. We are still going to sustain our presence,” Philippine Coast Guard spokesman Commodore Jay Tarriela told a livestreamed news conference.
“There are already plans in place for asking for deployment,” he said, though he declined to offer details, including when this would happen, citing operational security.
Tarriela said the Philippine Coast Guard had removed its flagship BRP Teresa Magbanua from the reef on Sunday due to unfavorable weather, depleted supplies of daily necessities and the need to evacuate personnel requiring medical care.
He denied the ship's return was related to Beijing’s repeated demands that Manila remove the vessel from the area — located well within the Philippines’ exclusive economic zone about 110 nautical miles (204 kilometers) from the Philippine shoreline.
Tarriela also rejected a comparison to a similar standoff over Scarborough Shoal in 2012, when China effectively took control of that South China Sea feature, which is also inside the Philippines' EEZ, from Manila.
Sabina Shoal, he noted, covers a much larger area than Scarborough Shoal and offers more access points, meaning that it would be difficult for China to prevent Philippine vessels from entering the 137-square-kilometer feature, which is known in China as Xianbin Reef and by the Philippines as Escoda Shoal.
“We have not lost anything. We did not abandon anything,” Tarriela said. “Escoda Shoal is still part of our exclusive economic zone. We can deploy vessels anytime we like. We can go there anytime we like.”
But Philippine vessels attempting to resupply the Teresa Magbanua had been stymied by the China Coast Guard. On Sunday, the China Coast Guard pledged to continue carrying out what it calls “law enforcement activities” in the waters near Sabina, which it says are under its jurisdiction.
The Philippine ship was also damaged in a collision with a Chinese vessel last month in the waters of Sabina Shoal. China Coast Guard and maritime militia vessels have repeatedly sought to block, ram and water-cannon Philippine ships near Sabina and other strategic locations in the waterway.
China claims virtually the entirety of the South China Sea under what is known as the nine-dash line, despite overlapping claims by Taiwan, Vietnam, Malaysia, Brunei, Indonesia and the Philippines.
But the waters near Sabina Shoal and several other islands Manila contests with Beijing have become dangerous flash points in the South China Sea — stoking fears of a miscalculation erupting into a wider clash that draws in the United States, which has a mutual defense pact with Manila.
A June confrontation saw Chinese coast guard members wield axes and a Philippine sailor lose his thumb in what was widely seen as a sharp escalation that highlighted Beijing’s willingness to push the envelope in the strategic waterway.
Top American officials have routinely emphasized that the 1951 U.S.-Philippine mutual defense treaty applies to armed attacks on either nation's armed forces or public vessels “anywhere in the Pacific and in the South China Sea.”
Meanwhile, a senior Chinese military official said last week that Beijing will "crush" any foreign incursion into its sovereign territory, including in the South China Sea.
While Beijing hopes the South China Sea would remain a sea of peace, "if the United States moves its pawns behind the scenes, if it pushes countries to the front line, or if the United States itself ends up on the front line, then we in the Chinese People's Liberation Army ... will never have any patience,” Chinese Lt. Gen. He Lei was quoted as saying at the Xiangshan Forum security conference in Beijing on Thursday.
"We in the Chinese People's Liberation Army will resolutely crush any foreign hostile encroachment on China's territorial, sovereign and maritime rights and interests with firm determination, staunch will, strong capability and effective means," He said.
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