MANILA: The Philippine coast guard on Monday said it had complied with a presidential order to remove a floating barrier placed by China’s coast guard to prevent Filipino fishing boats from entering a lagoon in a disputed shoal in the South China Sea.
Philippine officials condemned the installation of the 300-metre (980-foot) -long barrier at the entrance to the lagoon at Scarborough Shoal as a violation of international law and their Southeast Asian nation’s sovereignty.
The Philippines’ move underscores intensifying Philippine efforts to fight China’s increasingly aggressive actions, against many odds, in one of the world’s most hotly contested waters.
Chinese coast guard vessels laid the rope and net barrier, held up by buoys, last week as a Philippine government fisheries vessel approached and more than 50 Philippine fishing boats swarmed outside the shoal, the Philippine coast guard said. In Beijing, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin said the shoal and its adjacent waters are “China’s inherent territory,” where Beijing “has indisputable sovereignty”.