‘Why withdraw the ship?’ Locsin on 2012 Scarborough standoff

MANILA – Foreign Affairs Secretary Teodoro Locsin, Jr. continued to question the reason behind the pulling out of the Philippines’ ship in Scarborough Shoal during a standoff with China in 2012.

“If you believe, your government at that time believes that that is yours, why will you withdraw?” Locsin asked during the Talk to the People of President Rodrigo Duterte on Monday night.

“[W]hy did we yield possession? And that’s, I think, the first thing you must ask. Who gave the order to withdraw that ship? Because it is from there that we start having the problems that are separate — actually a separate issue from the arbitral award,” he added.

In April 2012, the Philippine government sent the BRP Gregorio del Pilar to Scarborough Shoal after a surveillance aircraft spotted eight Chinese vessels anchored inside the lagoon.

Upon inspection, it discovered a large amount of illegally collected corals, giant clams, and live sharks in the compartments of said ships.

At the time, two Chinese maritime surveillance ships managed to position themselves between the Philippine warship and the Chinese fishing vessels preventing the navy from arresting the poachers — the start of a tense standoff over the shoal, which is well within the Philippine exclusive economic zone. Eventually, the Philippine ship withdrew.

Recalling the incident, former Foreign Affairs Secretary Albert del Rosario last week explained that the United States brokered a deal for both nations to simultaneously pull out the ships but Chinese President Xi Jinping “deceitfully breached” the deal.

Locsin, on the other hand, said Washington’s participation was merely “to try to stop people from attacking each other” because it cannot force the Philippines nor China to withdraw in the first place.

“Now, if you believe, your government at that time believes that is yours, why will you withdraw? These are only good offices of the United States, it is a suggestion, ‘I think you should both withdraw.’ So what you should have done — I don’t want to say that like I know better after the fact — but the truth is, if I — if I have UNCLOS on my side saying we are within the exclusive economic zone and the Chinese ship is not, from my point of view, then I would say, I’ll just look at the other side and say go. When you go, I’ll go but you go first. Instead, our side withdrew,” he said.

“So what happens to our claim that this is ours? You just gave it up,” he added.

Locsin added that the Chinese side had “no intention” of attacking during the 2012 impasse, based on his previous conversation with Chinese Foreign Minister and State Councilor Wang Yi.

“I have talked to the Chinese, to Foreign Minister Wang Yi, they have no intention to do that. If we had kept up that face-off, it might have ended up in just the two sides talking to each other. But why we withdrew when we had UNCLOS in place that said under this law, we have the right to be here, you don’t? But we did,” he said.

When the Philippines pulled out its ship and the Chinese did not, Locsin said Washington had no obligation to go to war because the Mutual Defense Treaty can only be triggered with an attack against a Filipino public vessel.

“Nobody was attacked. We withdrew. If the Chinese wanted to attack, there was nobody to attack. The other side left,” he said.

“There’s no obligation to defend if you are not attacked and that is what was avoided, one ship walked — ah sailed away,” he added.

Scarborough Shoal or Bajo de Masinloc is an integral part of the Philippine territory and is located 124 nautical miles off the municipality of Masinloc in Zambales.