Video Shows US Ally Resupplying Military Outpost in Disputed Waters
China said it allowed the May 16 mission to proceed after notification by the Philippines, though the U.S. ally has maintained it "need not seek permission."
Newsweek reached out to the Philippine military and Chinese Foreign Ministry with emailed requests for comment.
Second Thomas Shoal-known in Manila as Ayungin Shoal and in Beijing as Ren'ai Reef-is situated within the Philippines' EEZ. The reef is uninhabited, except for a navy garrison stationed aboard a rusting warship, the BRP Sierra Madre, which the country deliberately grounded in 1999 to stake its claim.
China insists the rusting vessel's presence is illegal and accused its neighbor of smuggling in supplies to repair it. Beijing claims sovereignty over most features in the South China Sea, including Second Thomas Shoal, and in 2023 and 2024 took forceful measures-including blockades and water cannons-to obstruct supply missions.
Video shared by ABS-CBN show personnel aboard the Sierra Madre preparing to receive food and other supplies from the government-commissioned civilian vessel MV Lapu-Lapu.
Four Chinese coast guard ships were observed in the area "but did not do any coercive or aggressive actions," Rear Admiral Roy Vincent Trinidad, a spokesperson for the Philippine Navy, told reporters on the sidelines of an ASEAN event in Pasay City.
It was the eighth such mission to take place without Chinese interference.
The two neighbors said they had reached a deal to manage future supply missions in July, just weeks after a particularly aggressive interception by Chinese maritime forces that left Philippine sailors injured and drew condemnation from several countries.
The exact terms of the agreement remain unclear, and each side has since accused the other of violating them.
"With the permission of the Chinese side, the Philippines sent a civilian boat to transport daily necessities to its illegal 'beached' warship at Ren'ai Reef," Chinese coast guard spokesperson Liu Dejun said in a May 20 statement. "It is hoped that the Philippines will honor its commitments, work with China in the same direction, and jointly manage the maritime situation."
Trinidad, the Philippine Navy spokesperson, pledged missions to the Sierra Madre would continue. "We need not seek permission from any foreign power, much more from one that has encroached into our exclusive economic zone. These missions will continue," he said.
China has accused the Philippines of violating an alleged promise not to deliver construction materials to the warship-turned-military outpost.
A former spokesperson for Rodrigo Duterte, the Southeast Asian country's president from 2016 to 2022, made waves last year after appearing to suggest the leader had made a "gentlemen's agreement" to that effect in exchange for maintaining the status quo in the area.
President Ferdinand Marcos Jr., who took office in June 2022, has denied any knowledge of such an arrangement and said he was "horrified" by the idea.
South China Sea Probing Initiative, a Beijing-based think tank, wrote on X (formerly Twitter): "The gentleman's agreement works again. The China Coast Guard reported that under China's surveillance, the Philippines had just completed a supply mission without the Philippine Coast Guard for the grounded warship at Second Thomas Shoal on May 16."
China will almost certainly continue pressing its claims within the Philippine EEZ and will most likely continue to face pushback from the Philippines.
The Marcos administration enjoys broad support on the South China Sea issue, with a November poll showing that 84 percent of Filipinos back the government's pushback.
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