Peaceful SCS, distant reality

The just-concluded 43rd ASEAN Summit held in Jakarta, Indonesia on 4-7 September was fraught with tension throughout the four-day event, with Indonesian President Joko Widodo asking the participating leaders and dignitaries to take a step back and not add fuel to such burning issues as the unresolved crisis in Myanmar where the military junta continues to refuse to comply with a previously agreed on Five Point Consensus; fears of North Korea supplying arms to Russia; the continuing war in Ukraine, as well as the persistent assertiveness of China in the South China Sea.

With superpower representatives US Vice President Kamala Harris, Chinese Premier Li Qiang, and Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov monitoring the proceedings in Jakarta, summit host Widodo declared: "We all have a responsibility to not create new conflicts, new tensions, new war, and at the same time, we also have a responsibility to reduce tensions."

Cooperation and multilateralism risk being replaced by "the rule of the strong," said Widodo, as he warned that "the world will be destroyed if conflicts and tensions in one place are taken to another place. I can guarantee you that we will be destroyed if we are not able to manage differences if we join the currents of rivalry."

Seemingly unmindful of the criticism against Beijing's increasingly belligerent moves in the South China Sea and Taiwan, the Chinese Premier, too, issued his own warning: "To keep differences under control, it is essential to oppose picking sides, block confrontation and a new Cold War, and ensure that disagreements and disputes among countries are properly handled."

This comes from a top official of a global power that has just released a new territorial map claiming Chinese ownership of the entire South China Sea. Its former "nine-dash line" has been extended to a "10-dash line" encroaching into waters off Taiwan's eastern coast, thus escalating even more intense objections by countries in territorial disputes with China — the Philippines, Vietnam, and now Taiwan.

Unveiled on 28 August, China's new "standard map" also designates Arunachi Pradesh in India's northeastern state — "South Tibet" to the Chinese — as part of its territory.

Left unchallenged, we in Asia will probably wake up one day with the land on which our homes are built being claimed as territory under Chinese imperium.

No naming of actual countries, but to all present at the Summit, there could have been no one else in our own Chief of State's mind but China when he took to the podium to address his ASEAN counterparts.

Never mind that in January in Beijing, he and Chinese President Xi Jinping spoke earnestly about the maturing of bilateral ties between the two countries. At the Summit in Jakarta, Marcos, hinting at the insincerity of Beijing, said, "We cannot emphasize enough that actions — not words — should be the ultimate measure of our commitment to securing peace and stability in the South China Sea."

Just a month ago, the Philippine government condemned a China Coast Guard ship's "excessive and offensive" use of a water cannon to block a Philippine Coast Guard vessel escorting chartered boats from delivering supplies to a shoal occupied by Filipino Navy personnel.

"The challenge for us remains," Marcos stressed, "that we must never allow the international peaceful order to be subjected to the forces of might applied for hegemonic ambition."

This, even as the President acknowledged that ASEAN's vision of a peaceful and stable South China Sea "remains a distant reality."

"We do not seek conflict," Marcos said. "But it is our duty as citizens and as leaders to always rise and meet any challenge to our sovereignty, our sovereign rights, and our maritime jurisdiction in the South China Sea."

In the end, other than expressions of concern over intensifying geopolitical tensions in the region included in the final statement that wrapped up the 43rd ASEAN Summit, the issues deemed critical by the bloc were far from a resolution.

ASEAN has its share of critics, with some calling it a "toothless talk shop." But ASEAN, in truth, does have material value through its ability to have rival global powers come together, sitting them down to talk and thresh out their differences in private.

As long as opposing forces continue to talk, there is always a chance that a rapprochement might be met at one point in time. The danger is when factions on opposite sides of the table take extreme positions, turn cold and their worldview frozen and beyond thaw.