MALACAÑANG on Thursday came to the defense of Foreign Affairs Secretary Alan Peter Cayetano, who seemed to have echoed the soft-landing policy of President Rodrigo Duterte on Philippines' rift with China over the contested South China Sea.
Presidential Spokesperson Ernesto Abella said Cayetano's approach on how to deal with China’s extensive claim to the resource-rich waters was just “overly-interpreted.”
“I think that’s overly interpreting things. As being chair, our main task was to produce a joint communiqué that all Asean members would sign regardless of differences in position,” Abella said in a press conference.
The Association of Southeast Asian Nations’ (Asean) foreign ministers, in a joint statement released on August 6, emphasized “non-militarization” and “self-restraint” in the South China Sea.
“We emphasized the importance of non-militarization and self-restraint in the conduct of all activities by claimants and all other states, including those mentioned in the [Declaration of Conduct] that could further complicate the situation and escalate tensions in the South China Sea,” the joint communiqué read.
Cayetano, chair of Asean’s top diplomats, admitted Tuesday, August 8, that he wanted to exclude concerns on China’s land reclamation and militarization activities in the joint statement.
He added that his position on the joint communiqué was based on the directives of President Rodrigo Duterte, who seeks “non-adversarial” approach to resolve the territorial disputes.
“I don’t want to include it. It’s not reflective of the present position,” the Foreign Affairs secretary said.
It could be recalled that the issue on China's land reclamation and militarization in the South China Sea had been omitted on Asean leaders' joint statement released in May.
Senator Leila de Lima slammed Cayetano who appeared to be “China’s spokesperson in Asean.”
De Lima said the Philippine government apparently turned out to be China’s “lackey” in the regional bloc.
“The Duterte government and DFA Secretary Alan Peter Cayetano have not only completely relinquished the Philippines’ lead role in Asean of countering China’s ambition of regional domination. They have accomplished more than that,” she said. (SunStar Philippines)