US Ambassador to the Philippines MaryKay Carlson met with Defense Secretary Gilberto Teodoro Jr. and officials of the Armed Forces of the Philippines to discuss plans for defense cooperation, which included new joint patrols in the West Philippine Sea.
“Certainly, this coming year, we expect both of our militaries to continue to cooperate and to exercise and to do whatever it takes both bilaterally, multilaterally to ensure the safety of our peoples,” said Carlson in JP Soriano’s Saturday 24 Oras Weekend report.
While the US Ambassador gave no details on discussions of future joint patrols, AFP chief General Romeo Brawner Jr. stated that the joint patrols were necessary to better enforce a rules-based international order.
Retired Senior Associate Justice Antonio Carpio, who was part of the legal team that won against China at the Permanent Court of Arbitration in 2016, also agreed that the joint patrols should continue.
“We should have a series of joint patrols every year especially because we will be sending our service ship and drilling ship to Reed Bank, and when we send our service ship and drill ship there should be a joint patrol just in case the Chinese Coast Guard will try to shoo away our service ship and drill ship,” he said.
The first Philippine-US joint patrol was conducted in November 2023 at the West Philippine Sea and other areas of the ocean near Taiwan that were within the Philippines’ Exclusive Economic Zone.
China protested these patrols claiming that it interfered with existing negotiations with other countries regarding the South China Sea.
The Chinese Embassy and the Department of Foreign Affairs have yet to comment on Carpio’s statement. — Jiselle Casucian/DVM, GMA Integrated news
