Philippine Coast Guard Commodore Jay Tarriela, spokesperson for West Philippine Sea.
INQUIRER FILE PHOTO / RICHARD A. REYES
MANILA, Philippines — That is the primary time China has deployed Individuals’s Liberation Military (PLA) Navy vessels to shadow the Philippine Coast Guard (PCG) within the West Philippine Sea, an company official revealed on Wednesday.
Commodore Jay Tarriela, Philippine Coast Guard (PCG) spokesperson for the West Philippine Sea, revealed that they noticed PLA Navy vessels in separate incidents of harassment in Bajo de Masinloc and Escoda Shoal.
“That is really the primary time that we have now documented a PLA Navy warship shadowing a Coast Guard Vessel in Bajo de Masinlo at a distance of solely 300 yards,” Tarriela mentioned in a press convention.
Earlier, Tarriela launched a press release revealing that 5 Chinese language vessels additionally reportedly harassed Philippine vessels conducting a routine maritime patrol inside Bajo de Masinloc.
In the identical press briefing, the PCG official additionally bared 4 Philippine vessels deployed close to Escoda Shoal encountered aggressive actions from a number of Chinese language vessels.
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Tarriela defined that the vessels have been responding to a name from Filipino fishermen, saying that small Chinese language Coast Guard (CCG) boats have been stopping them from coming into Escoda Shoal.
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READ: Kiko Pangilinan condemns newest Chinese language bullying in West Philippine Sea
Two CCG vessels tried to dam BFAR’s BRP Datu Romapenet from reaching the Filipino fishermen throughout their patrol.
One of many Chinese language vessels additionally sideswiped BRP Datu Bankaw twice and rammed BRP Romapenet, destroying a few of its construction.
Final Monday, the PCG reported {that a} Chinese language Individuals’s Military Navy helicopter harassed Filipino fishermen in Rozul (Iroquois) Reef within the West Philippine Sea over the weekend.
Beijing’s continued aggression was based mostly on its assertion of sovereignty over virtually all the South China Sea, together with a lot of the West Philippine Sea, because it continues to reject a July 2016 Arbitral Award that successfully dismissed its claims and dominated in favor of Manila.
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The landmark ruling stemmed from a case filed by Manila in 2013, a yr after its tense standoff with Beijing over Panatag Shoal, whose lagoon the latter now successfully controls.
