Philippines and China in South China Sea confrontation

China and the Philippines traded accusations after the coastguards of both countries had a confrontation around a contested shoal in the South China Sea.

What China's coast guard alleges

In the latest row, China alleged that four Philippine ships tried to enter waters — claimed by China — around the Scarborough Shoal which prompted Beijing's "exercised control," Coast Guard spokesperson Liu Dejun said in a statement.

"On December 4, Philippine Coast Guard ships... attempted to intrude into China's territorial waters around Huangyan Island," Dejun said, using the Chinese name for Scarborough Shoal.

The Philippine vessels "came dangerously close to regular law enforcement patrol vessels of the China Coast Guard", Dejun said, without giving details about Beijing's actions.

What the Philippines coast guard alleges

The Philippines said that the Chinese Coast Guard took "aggressive actions" and fired a water cannon at a government vessel while it was on patrol near the Scarborough Shoal.

The Chinese ship "fired a water cannon... aiming directly at the vessel's navigational antennas," Philippine Coast Guard spokesman Commodore Jay Tarriela said in a statement.

In a video, released by Manila on Wednesday, a China coast guard ship can be seen hitting the right side of a fisheries department vessel, with the crew shouting, "Collision! Collision!"

The latest confrontation between the two countries in the South China Sea comes after a diplomatic row in November that involvedChina drawing baseline "territorial waters" around the shoal.

The area is a prime fishing patch and has remained a flashpoint between the two countries since 2012 when China seized it from the Philippines.

The shoal is located some 240 kilometers (150 miles) west of the Philippines' main island of Luzon and nearly 900 kilometers from the nearest major Chinese land mass of Hainan province.

China claims nearly the entirety of the South China Sea as its territory, despite a 2016 ruling by the Permanent Court of Arbitration in The Hague rejecting these claims.

For reference, Scarborough Shoal, where these confrontations frequently take place, is over 460 nautical miles (765 kilometers) from the nearest Chinese shore, on Hainan Island, and is well within the Philippine EEZ. 

mfi/kb (AFP, Reuters)

Correction, 12.09.2024: A previous version of this article referred to the Scarborough Shoal as Chinese territorial waters without making it clear that this Chinese claim has been rejected by an international court. This has now been corrected. We apologize for the error.