With Philippines visit, US VP Harris shows support against ‘intimidation’ in South China Sea

US Vice President Kamala Harris tours the village of Tagburos in Palawan, Philippines, Tuesday, Nov. 22, 2022. (AP Photo)
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Updated 23 November 2022
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With Philippines visit, US VP Harris shows support against ‘intimidation’ in South China Sea

  • Harris is highest-ranking American official to visit Palawan, island off disputed South China Sea
  • Philippines, China have long-running dispute over strategic, resource-rich waterway

MANILA: The historic visit of US Vice President Kamala Harris to a Philippine island off the South China Sea this week was meant to showcase Washington’s support for one of its oldest security allies in Asia, experts have said, as the Southeast Asian country faced what she called “intimidation and coercion” in the disputed waterway.

Harris’ stop on Palawan, an island facing the South China Sea, was part of a three-day visit to the Philippines amid high geopolitical tensions in the region.

She was the highest-ranking American official to have visited the isle, her arrival taking place just days after an incident between the Philippine navy and the Chinese coastguard.

Onboard a Philippine vessel docked in Puerto Princesa bay on Tuesday, Harris said the US and broader international community “have a profound stake in the future of this region.”

“America’s prosperity relies on the billions of dollars that flow through these waters every day. And we are proud to work with you in your mission,” she added.

“As an ally, the United States stands with the Philippines in the face of intimidation and coercion in the South China Sea.”

The South China Sea is a strategic and resource-rich waterway claimed by China almost in its entirety, but other countries, including the Philippines, Vietnam, Malaysia, and Brunei, also have overlapping claims.

In 2016, an international tribunal in The Hague dismissed China’s sweeping claim, a ruling that was rejected by Beijing as it continued to send fishing vessels and raise structures in the region, part of which is a Philippine exclusive economic zone.

A Philippine military commander said on Monday that a Chinese coastguard ship “forcefully retrieved” a piece of rocket that was being towed by a Philippine vessel, a claim that China has denied.

“Beijing just can’t seem to stop harassing and coercing its smaller neighbors,” Gregory B. Poling, a South China Sea expert from the Center for Strategic and International Studies, told Arab News.

The Philippine government has filed hundreds of diplomatic protests against Chinese activity in the South China Sea in the past few years. Amid increasing tensions with Beijing, the Philippines established in May three coast guard outposts on three islands in the disputed maritime area to monitor ship movements.

Harris’ trip also came amid strained relations between China and the US, particularly over Taiwan, the democratically governed island China regards as its own.

“(But) I don’t think China was a primary audience; the Philippines was,” Poling said. “It sends China the same message: That the United States is committed to standing with its ally.

“The trip sends a message of reassurance to the Philippines, that the United States remains committed to modernizing the alliance and defending Filipino lives and rights in the South China Sea.”

Arsenio Andolong, a spokesperson from the Philippines’ Department of National Defense, said Harris’ visit sent a strong message that Washington considered Manila “an important ally.”

“The defense department sees this as a really clear message that they will stand by their obligations under the MDT (mutual defense treaty),” Andolong told Arab News.

The treaty is a 70-year-old pact stipulating that the Philippines and US would support each other if either were attacked by an external party.

Harris’ trip was “valuable” as it showed how the US “will live up to its obligations” under the treaty, Stephen Cutler, security expert and former FBI legal attache, told Arab News.

“I also hope that they will go far beyond the military significance,” Cutler said. “I think what she does, by coming here and making the kinds of comments that she did, was to show that the United States is interested in a lot more than simply military matters.”


North Korean foreign minister arrives in Moscow for talks

Updated 9 sec ago
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North Korean foreign minister arrives in Moscow for talks

  • The visit comes after Pyongyang tested a new intercontinental ballistic missile this week
  • Washington says there are 10,000 North Korean troops in Russia
MOSCOW: North Korean Foreign Minister Choe Son Hui has arrived in Moscow and will hold strategic consultations with her Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov on Friday, the Russian Foreign Ministry said.
Maria Zakharova, a spokeswoman for the ministry, in a post on her official Telegram channel, published photographs of Lavrov meeting Choe at a Moscow train station.
“Today, talks between the heads of Russia and the DPRK (Democratic People’s Republic of Korea) will be held in Moscow. Sergei Lavrov greeted his counterpart with a bouquet of flowers,” said Zakharova.
“The meeting began at the Yaroslavsky railway station (in Moscow), where a memorial plaque was unveiled to mark the occasion of Kim Il Sung’s 1949 visit to the USSR,” she said, referring to the founder of the DPRK.
The visit, Choe’s second in six weeks, comes after Pyongyang tested a new intercontinental ballistic missile this week and as Washington says there are 10,000 North Korean troops in Russia, including as many as 8,000 deployed in Russia’s Kursk region where Ukrainian troops have dug in.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said on Thursday that the United States expected the North Korean troops in Kursk region to enter the fight against Ukraine in the coming days.
Moscow has neither denied nor directly confirmed the presence of North Korean troops on its soil. President Vladimir Putin has said it is for Russia to decide how to implement a treaty he signed with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un in June that includes a mutual defense clause.

Shootout in western France wounds five: minister

Updated 36 min 14 sec ago
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Shootout in western France wounds five: minister

  • 15-year-old boy is between life and death after the gunbattle erupted in front of a restaurant overnight
Paris: A drug trafficking-related shooting has left a teenager and four others seriously wounded in the western French city of Poitiers, Interior Minister Bruno Retailleau said Friday.
The 15-year-old boy is between life and death after the gunbattle erupted in front of a restaurant overnight, Retailleau told BFMTV/RMC radio.

Drone crashes on oil depot in Russia’s Stavropol region

Updated 01 November 2024
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Drone crashes on oil depot in Russia’s Stavropol region

  • There were no casualties in the incident at the Svetlograd oil depot, Vladimirov said on Telegram

MOSCOW: A drone fell on an oil depot in Russia’s southern Stavropol region, local governor Vladimir Vladimirov said on Friday.
It was the second suspected Ukrainian attack in consecutive days on Russian fuel and energy targets, following a lull of about seven weeks since a fuel facility in Tula was attacked on Sept. 10.
There were no casualties in the incident at the Svetlograd oil depot, Vladimirov said on Telegram.
Baza Telegram channel, which is close to Russia’s security services, posted a CCTV video purportedly showing the attack on the oil depot. The video showed that at least one of several fuel tanks was swiftly engulfed by a fireball.
On Thursday, several fuel and energy facilities were targeted in a Ukrainian drone attack on the central Russian region of Bashkortostan, home to Bashneft, a major oil company controlled by Russia’s leading oil producer, Rosneft .
Bashneft operates several refineries in the region, playing a significant role in Russia’s energy infrastructure.
The attacks come days after the Financial Times reported early-stage talks between Ukraine and Russia about potentially halting airstrikes on each other’s energy facilities. The Kremlin dismissed the report.
Russia has called such attacks terrorism, while Ukraine, which stepped up the drone strikes on Russian energy facilities since the start of the year, has said it is striking back in retaliation for attacks on its energy infrastructure.
Andrei Kartapolov, chairman of Russia’s lower house of parliament’s defense committee, said in comments to Life media channel earlier this week, that there were no talks on halting the attacks.
“We are not going to spare anyone,” he said.
European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said in September that Russia had knocked out the gigawatt equivalent of over half of Ukraine’s energy infrastructure. The European Union aims to restore 2.5 GW of capacity, about 15 percent of the country’s needs, she said, referring to proposed EU-funded repairs.


Eight dead as huge fire engulfs cooking oil factory near Jakarta

Updated 01 November 2024
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Eight dead as huge fire engulfs cooking oil factory near Jakarta

  • The factory is operated by PT Primus Sanus Cooking Oil Industrial (Priscolin)

JAKARTA: Eight people died in a large fire at a cooking oil factory near the Indonesian capital Jakarta, local fire authorities said on Friday.
Around 20 firefighting trucks are at the site and have contained the blaze in most areas of the factory, authorities said.
Footage from Metro TV showed flames and billowing black smoke coming out of a building in the center of an industrial complex in Bekasi, a city on Jakarta’s eastern edge. The report said roads had been closed around the factory.
All of the bodies had been evacuated from the site, Suhartono, head of Bekasi’s fire department SAID, adding that three other people were injured.
But the number of casualties could still rise, he said.
Local authorities are investigating the cause of the fire.
The factory is operated by PT Primus Sanus Cooking Oil Industrial (Priscolin), said Suhartono.


Schoolgirls, policeman among five killed in roadside blast in Pakistan’s Balochistan

Updated 01 November 2024
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Schoolgirls, policeman among five killed in roadside blast in Pakistan’s Balochistan

QUETTA: At least five people, including three schoolgirls and a policeman, were killed in a roadside blast in Pakistan’s southwestern Balochistan province on Friday morning, police said, in the latest incident of violence to hit the restive region.
The blast appeared to target a police van passing by a girls school in the Mastung district of the province, according to police and local administration officials.
Fateh Baloch, in-charge of the Mastung police station, said the police mobile van came under attack when it was on a routine patrol on Friday morning.
“Five people, including a police constable and three minor schoolgirls, were killed and 13 others injured in the blast,” Baloch told Arab News.
No group immediately claimed responsibility for the blast.
“We have cordoned-off the area and are shifting the injured to the hospital,” Baz Muhammad Marri, the Mastung deputy commissioner, told Arab News.
Balochistan, which borders Iran and Afghanistan and is home to major China-led projects such as a strategic port and a gold and copper mine, has been the site of a decades-long separatist insurgency by ethnic Baloch militants. The province has lately seen an increase in attacks by separatist militants.
On Tuesday, five people were killed in an attack by armed men on the construction site of a small dam in Balochistan’s Panjgur district. The outlawed Baloch Liberation Army (BLA), the most prominent of several separatist groups, claimed responsibility for the attack along with killing of two other persons in Kech and Quetta districts.
This month, 21 miners working at privately run coal mines were killed in an attack by unidentified gunmen.
The separatists accuse the central government of exploiting Balochistan’s mineral and gas resources. The Pakistani state denies the allegation and says it is working to uplift the region through development initiatives.
Besides Baloch separatists, the restive region also has a presence of religiously motivated militant groups, who frequently target police and security forces.
Islamabad says militants mainly associated with the Pakistani Taliban frequently launch attacks from Afghanistan and has even blamed Kabul’s Afghan Taliban rulers for facilitating anti-Pakistan groups. Kabul denies the allegation.

- This article originally appeared on Arab News Pakistan