China hopes PH to 'make a wiser choice', amend fault

Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi, during a press conference in Manila after meeting Foreign Affairs Secretary Albert del Rosario, said Philippines should amend its own fault which is hindering the improvement and development of China-Philippines relations. The Chinese official is referring to the arbitration case initiated by Philippines before the Permanent Court of Arbitration.

“One’s fault should be amended by oneself,” Wang Yi told reporters in Manila as posted in the official website of China Foreign Affairs Ministry. “It is hoped that the Philippine side will make a wiser choice.”

He likened the arbitration case to a knot. “We do not hope the knot get tighter and tighter and even become a deadlock. How to loosen and open the knot lies on the Philippine side.”

The tribunal at the Permanent Court of Arbitration already ruled that it has jurisdiction over the case and will hear the merits of case on November 24 to 30. China, through different officials in different occasions, repeatedly voiced out that it wants to go back to bilateral negotiations in respect to historical facts and international law.

Philippines said bilateral exchanges with China did not proved capable of resolving West Philippine Sea dispute. Secretary del Rosario told the tribunal last July that Beijing imposes that “the Philippines must recognize and accept China’s sovereignty before meaningful discussion of other issues could take place.”