Ayungin Shoal is part of the Philippines’ 200-nautical-mile exclusive economic zone, according to the July 12, 2016 arbitral ruling against China.
The assurance of U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd J. Austin III on Feb. 2 that the Mutual Defense Treaty is applicable on the West Philippine Sea will be tested in Ayungin Shoal as Chinese ships become more determined to block any more attempts by the Philippine Navy to repair the dilapidated BRP Sierra Madre, which is holding out as a block to China’s expansionism in the South China Sea.
Ayungin Shoal, internationally known as Second Thomas Shoal and called Ren’ai Reef by China, is part of the 200-nautical-mile exclusive economic zone (EEZ) and continental shelf of the Philippines, according to the July 12, 2016 decision of the Permanent Court of Arbitration.
By ELLEN T. TORDESILLAS NO ifs and buts about it: the Philippines and China are no longer friends. That’s a decision that the Philippines made when it hauled China to the United Nations Arbitral Tribunal over the latter’s all -South -China -Sea-encompassing 9-dash line map. As former ambassador to the United Nations Lauro Baja
THE rising tension at the Ayungin shoal, just 21 nautical miles from Mischief Reef where China has built fortifications, could be a test on the usefulness of the 1951 PH-US Mutual Defense Treaty In its statement issued last Friday, the Department of Foreign Affairs said: “The BRP Sierra Madre, a commissioned Philippine Naval Vessel, was
CHINESE Foreign Secretary Wang Yi made an offer yesterday during the Asean Regional Forum in Brunei that rendered the articulate Philippine Foreign Secretary Albert del Rosario speechless. Del Rosario told reporters that Wang said “Scarborough and Ayungin were theirs, historically, and we were the ones sending ships, interdicting their fishermen, and the grounded ship has
