Trump assures Marcos: PH’s South China Sea concerns to be ‘taken up’ with Xi

Former US President Donald Trump has assured Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. that he will “take up the concerns of the Philippines” in his upcoming meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping, Malacañang said on Thursday night, July 23. Trump made the commitment to Marcos in a phone call on Thursday, where the two leaders “discussed the current global, economic and security situation,” Palace Communications Secretary Dave Gomez said in a press statement. Trump and Xi are expected to meet when the latter goes on a US trip in September. The phone call happened just a day after US State Secretary Marco Rubio met with Marcos and top government officials in Malacañang on July 22. Gomez said that during Rubio’s courtesy call on Marcos, the latter “updated” the US official on “recent incidents in the South China Sea.” Gomez said the call with Trump was an “offshoot” of Rubio’s Palace call, which was part of his first visit to Manila as state secretary. Rubio was in the Philippines to participate in high-level meetings of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), which Manila chairs. On July 20, or just as foreign ministers from ASEAN and beyond were arriving in Manila for the meetings, China Coast Guard personnel entered Ayungin (Second Thomas) Shoal, triggering a confrontation with Philippine soldiers posted on the grounded BRP Sierra Madre. A Filipino soldier was wounded in the head and another was also injured, as a result of the melee. Manila has filed several protests over the incident, which Beijing claims was instigated by Manila. Hours before his phone call with Trump, Marcos visited the two injured soldiers in Palawan and conferred to them the Order of Lapu-Lapu. Ayungin Shoal is a low tide elevation that’s part of the Philippines’ exclusive economic zone in an area it calls the West Philippine Sea. China does not recognize the 2016 Arbitral Award, which affirmed the Philippines’ entitlements in those waters, including the validity of its EEZ. Beijing, in fact, claims almost all of the South China Sea, contrary to the award and international law. The incident was brought up again during Philippine Foreign Secretary Maria Theresa Lazaro’s meeting with China’s Foreign Minister Wang Yi. Wang, in return, also protested the incident. Manila and Beijing had earlier summoned each other’s envoys to protest the incident. The shoal is among the flashpoints of tensions between Manila and Beiing in the South China Sea. In 2024, CCG personnel harassed Filipino soldiers already moored at the base of the ship. A Filipino soldier lost his thumb from China’s ramming. Navy equipment was also destroyed by the CCG. It was an incident many feared would trigger the Mutual Defense Treaty between the Philppines and the US. Manila then, however, did not invoke it. The two Asian countries later settled on a provisional agreement whose details are not public. China’s envoy to Manila Jing Quan claims the agreement included the barring of construction materials in resupply missions. Manila has denied this claim and said the agreement “does not concede the Philippines’ sovereignty, sovereign rights and jurisdiction.”