President Xi Jinping affirms 600-year Sulu-China alliance

The convenor of the Mindanao Sulu Unification Movement (MSUM) confirmed on Wednesday that no less than Chinese President Xi Jinping affirmed the China-Sulu alliance during the culmination of the 600th-year death anniversary of the East King of Sulu at his tomb on 20 September 2017 in Dezhou City, Shandong Province, China.

The King of East Sulu, Sultan Alimud Din, met Emperor Cheung of the Ming Dynasty in the 17th century.

Abraham Idjirani, one of the delegates who attended the event, told the Daily Tribune that President Xi addressed the delegations through a large LCD screen. He acknowledged the journey of the Sulu King, who died in China while promoting goodwill and commercial trade between the Ming Dynasty and the Kingdom of East Sulu.

Idjirani said President Xi's speech, interpreted by the late Pastor Boy Saycon, a diplomatic consultant of the Sultanate, affirmed the ancient alliance.

"The legacy of the 1405 treaty stood as the soul of the China-Sulu relationship. Despite centuries, the Chinese government invited the 35th Sultan of Sulu, Phugdalun Kiram II, to attend the commemoration of this historic event, which is recorded in the annals of China-Sulu history," he said.

Idjirani said the China-Sulu alliance was formalized by the signing of a treaty known as "A Treaty in the Status of an Independent Tributary State of China" in 1405.

Fast forward to 1915, a similar agreement—the Carpenter-Kiram Treaty—was forged, placing Mindanao, Sulu, and North Borneo under a U.S. protectorate.

Idjirani further revealed that the Sultanate of Sulu and North Borneo, or the Bangsa Suluk Nation, submitted a petition in 2004 to the UN through its satellite office in Makati, Metro Manila, to repossess Sabah.

The 2004 petition was anchored on sovereign, legal, and historic rights and adopted internationally accepted arguments and positions. It adhered to peaceful settlement principles, addressing ancestral territories still occupied.

The petition also referenced the 1915 Kiram-Carpenter Agreement, the 1947 UN Charter Resolution, the 1950 UN Resolution, and the spirit and intent of the 1885 American Monroe Doctrine.

The late Raja Muda Agbimuddin Kiram spearheaded the submission, signed by hundreds of followers of the Sulu Sultanate across the Sulu Archipelago, Zamboanga Peninsula, and Palawan, on behalf of the 33rd Sultan Jamalul Kiram III, 34th Sultan Esmail Kiram II, and the Bangsa Suluk people.

Idjirani said the Sulu Kingdom viewed the UN as the proper tribunal to resolve the Sabah issue with Malaysia, using the UN’s principles on peaceful dispute settlements. The ruling family's commitment to a peaceful resolution was evident in Datu Raja Punjungan Kiram’s acceptance to reside in Sabah in 1968. This arrangement was based on a promise by Malaysia’s first Prime Minister, Tunku Abdul Rahman, to install him as the first Sultan under its protection.