Read this in The Manila Times digital edition.
SEVERAL parties are trumping up the nationalism card on the South China Sea (SCS)-West Philippine Sea (WPS) again and inaccurately inflating the importance of the US military presence in the area.
Megaphone diplomacy doesn't work on China, and this is shown repeatedly both locally and internationally. Our WPS dispute ignited in 2012 after then president Benigno "Noynoy" Aquino 3rd publicly arrested Chinese fishermen using our navy warship BRP Gregorio del Pilar, which even our Asean neighbors knew was a mistake. Then Foreign Affairs secretary Albert del Rosario further internationalized the dispute in the Asean Forum, which only got our banana farmers and fishermen blocked and areas taken over.
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