PCG: Chinese vessels’ intercept course’ with PH Navy warship ‘unverified’

INQUIRER FILE PHOTO

MANILA, Philippines — The Philippine Coast Guard (PCG) on Monday said news reports claiming that Chinese vessels were shadowing a Philippine Navy warship in the West Philippine Sea are “unverified.”

Two Chinese ships and the Philippine Navy’s BRP Andres Bonifacio allegedly engaged in an “intercept course” on Saturday, February 4, in the West Philippine Sea.

“As of 06 February 2023, the PCG communicates that the said incident report is unverified,” it said in a statement sent to reporters, which clarifies earlier new reports quoting PCG spokesperson Commodore Armand Balilo that the BRP Andres Bonifacio was monitored and tailed by the Chinese vessels while conducting a patrol and search mission within the country’s 200-nautical mile exclusive economic zone (EEZ).

But the PCG also said in the same statement that the information on such an incident came from Ray Powell, an American defense and security expert.

In 2016, the Permanent Court of Arbitration (PCA) based in The Hague, Netherlands, favored the Philippines’ position and invalidated China’s nine-dash line claim that covers almost the entire South China Sea, including the West Philippine Sea. But Beijing has since been ignoring the historic decision of the United Nations-backed tribunal.

READ: PH wins arbitration case over South China Sea

According to the PCA, China’s assertion on the area had no basis in international law and that it had violated the Philippines’ sovereign right to fish and explore resources in the West Philippine Sea, the waters within the Philippines’ 370-kilometer EEZ.

In 2013, President Benigno S. Aquino III filed the PCA complaint.
It disputed China’s claim to more than 80% of the South China Sea, including Brunei, Malaysia, the Philippines, and Vietnam’s EEZs.

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KGA/abc