On Saturday, the Chinese Coast Guard used water cannons against Filipino ships seeking to deliver supplies to troops at an outpost in the West Philippine Sea which Beijing asserts as the South China Sea.
The Filipino boat that came under Chinese attack was a civilian boat. It was then conducted by two navy ships and two coast guard vessels.
The boat was on a monthly supply run to a small number of Filipino marines stationed on the “Sierra Madre”, a warship run aground on the Second Thomas Shoal in 1999 to reinforce Manila’s maritime claims in the area.
According to a statement from the Philippine Coast Guard, ‘One of its ships was impeded and encircled by a Chinese coast guard vessel and two ships from the Chinese maritime militia’.
One of the Filipino vessels had been destroyed by a water canon during the dangerous maneuvers undertaken by the Chinese, who it said had shown a disregard for the Convention on the International Regulations for Preventing Collisions at Sea (COLREGS).
Manila’s statement said that the Chinese engaged in irresponsible and provocative behavior. China claims most of the South China Sea as its territorial waters, in another sign of its expansionist contentious in the region. Beijing has deployed vessels to disrupt efforts to resupply the “Sierra Madre” and described Saturday’s operation as control measures.
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