Manila has rejected Beijing's demand that it "disregard" an international ruling that invalidated the Asian giant's claims to much of the South China Sea before negotiating on the issue, the Philippines' foreign secretary said Tuesday. China last week denounced a UN-backed tribunal's finding that there was no legal basis for its claims to most of the strategic, resource-rich waters, provoking stern warnings from leaders from Japan to the EU that it must respect the rule-based global order.
Following the decision, Beijing asked Manila, which brought the case, "to open ourselves for bilateral negotiations but outside of and in disregard of the arbitral ruling", foreign minister Perfecto Yasay told broadcaster ABS-CBN. "This is something that I told him was not consistent with our constitution and our national interest," he said. The Hague-based Permanent Court of Arbitration (PCA) ruled that Beijing had violated the Philippines' sovereign rights to exploit resources in waters up to 340 kilometres (230 miles) beyond its coast, called its exclusive economic zone.
It said there was no legal basis to China's claims to much of the sea, embodied in a "nine-dash line" dating from 1940s maps. Yasay's comments were more forceful than previous Philippine reactions, with Manila's new President Rodrigo Duterte keen to restore relations with Beijing and promising not to "taunt or flaunt" the verdict. Many other countries have been more outspoken. At an Asia-Europe summit in Mongolia at the weekend, Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and European Union President Donald Tusk took China to task for its refusal to respect the decision.
China has long denied the tribunal's authority to rule on the case, calling it a "fraud" and accusing its members of accepting money from Manila. Yasay and his Chinese counterpart Wang Yi discussed the possibility of talks on the sidelines of the Ulan Bator summit but made no headway, he said, quoting Wang as telling him: "If you will insist on the ruling, discussing along those lines, then we might be headed for a confrontation." Direct talks were unlikely soon in the light of Beijing's refusal to accept the ruling, Yasay said.