New President Ferdinand Marcos Junior warned Thursday that he will not allow China to “trample” the rights of the Philippines in the South China Sea, of which the two countries dispute several areas.
• Read also: Philippines: overwhelming victory of Marcos Junior in the presidential election
“We have a very important judgment in our favor and we will use it to continue to assert our territorial rights. It is not a claim. It is already our territorial right”, declared Mr. Marcos in an interview with the local press.
The Permanent Court of Arbitration in The Hague sided with Manila in 2016, finding Beijing’s claims to most of the South China Sea to be groundless.
But China is ignoring this arbitration, and outgoing Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte has chosen not to insist so as not to offend Beijing, hoping in return for billions of dollars in investments.
Mr. Marcos, who was proclaimed president on Wednesday and will take office next month, assures that he will “not allow a single millimeter of our maritime coastal rights to be trampled”.
“We are talking about China. We speak with China consistently and with a strong voice,” he said.
And to add however: “we cannot go to war with them. That’s the last thing we need today.”
Son of the former dictator of the same name, Mr. Marcos Jr is the first presidential candidate to win an absolute majority since his father was overthrown in 1986, forcing his family into exile in the United States.
The new president adopted the main policies of his predecessor, Rodrigo Duterte, whose daughter Sara Duterte, his running mate, was proclaimed new vice president.
In terms of foreign policy, Marcos said he did not want to take the “unorthodox approach” of his predecessor, who used to unsettle diplomats with his inflammatory rhetoric and unpredictable nature.
He said he wanted to find a balance between China and the United States, which compete for the closest ties with the Philippine administration.
“We are a small player among very big geopolitical giants. We have to chart our own course,” Marcos said.
“I don’t subscribe to the Cold War (logic) where we had these spheres of influence, where you were under either the Soviet Union or the United States,” he added.
“I think we have to find an independent foreign policy where we are friends with everyone. It’s the only way”.