纽约时报中文网 - 英文原版-英China Deploys Dozens of Ships to Block Philippine Protest Flotilla
May 16, 2024 5 min 1028 words
《纽约时报》的这篇报道主要内容是：中国部署数十艘船只，阻挡菲律宾前往中业岛的抗议船队。报道援引了菲律宾军方发言人及该国记者的说法，称中国船只“入侵”了菲律宾的“领海”，并详细描述了菲律宾船队抗议的细节。该报道还提到了中国外交部发言人对此事件的回应，但同时继续以偏向的角度进行解读，并引用了其他西方媒体对该事件的报道，以强化其对中国的指责。 评论：这篇报道延续了《纽约时报》一贯对华强硬的立场，以偏激的言辞渲染了中国与菲律宾之间的海上争端。报道虽援引了中国外交部发言人的回应，但却没有给予足够重视，而是继续以西方媒体的角度进行解读，缺乏客观中立。报道中出现“入侵”“封锁”等词汇，显然是站在中国对立面进行道德审判，而不是客观陈述事实。该报道也忽略了中国在南海问题上的立场和历史经纬，以及菲律宾此前在有关海域的单方面举动，有误导读者之嫌。
China has sent dozens of coast guard and maritime militia vessels toward a disputed atoll in the South China Sea, a large show of force aimed at blocking a civilian protest flotilla from the Philippines, as tensions between the countries have flared.
The Filipino group organizing the flotilla of about 100 small fishing boats, led by five slightly bigger ones, said it wanted to assert the Philippines’ claims to Scarborough Shoal, an atoll controlled by Beijing that is closer to Manila.
But even before the motley Philippine fleet set out on Wednesday morning, China deployed a formidable contingent of much bigger government-run ships to the area, an intimidating escalation of its frequent assertions of control over vast expanses of sea far from its mainland.
“What we’re seeing this time, I would say, is definitely of another order,” said Ray Powell, the director of SeaLight, a group that monitors the South China Sea. “I think that the China Coast Guard is concerned that they’re going to try to sort of get too close, and so they’re sending an overwhelming force.”
Standoffs and close brushes between Filipino coast guard or civilian vessels and China’s larger coast guard and militia ships — which have used powerful water cannons to drive Philippine vessels away — have become more frequent in the past two years. This time, the size of the Chinese presence and the large number of civilian Filipino boats could make any encounter near the shoal more risky, Mr. Powell said.
“If China decides that they want to send the message that says, ‘We’ve had enough of this,’ then the scary thing you would not want to see is one of these small Filipino fishing boats hit by a water cannon, because that would not end well,” he said.
Rafaela David, one of the leaders of Atin Ito, the Filipino organization coordinating the protest at sea, said the group would not be deterred from trying to reach the atoll, which the Philippines calls Panatag Shoal. The fishing boats were expected to take about 20 hours to get there.
“We should normalize and regularize civilian access,” Ms. David said at a news briefing on Tuesday in Botolan, a town on the Philippines’ main island of Luzon. She said the number of protest boats would show that Filipinos are “not intimidated by someone as big as China.”
The group’s chances of breaking China’s hold on Scarborough Shoal, about 138 miles west of Luzon, seem slim.
By Tuesday, China had positioned five coast guard ships and six maritime militia vessels near the shoal and had another 25 or so maritime militia vessels sitting roughly 60 miles further out, said Mr. Powell, whose group is part of the Gordian Knot Center for National Security Innovation at Stanford University. That estimate, he added, did not include Chinese vessels that either do not carry automatic identification signal devices, which allow them to be tracked, or have turned off their devices in order to “go dark.”
Officials with the Philippine Navy and coast guard said they were deploying ships to escort the civilian Philippine flotilla.
On Wednesday, the Chinese government warned the Filipino protesters against nearing the shoal, which Beijing calls Huangyan Island.
“If the Philippine side abuses China’s good will and violates China’s territorial sovereignty and jurisdiction, China will defends its rights and take countermeasures in accordance with the law,” Wang Wenbin, a spokesman for the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs, said at a news conference in Beijing. “The responsibility and consequences will entirely rest with the Philippine side.”
Relations between Manila and Beijing have worsened in the past two years over their maritime disputes.
Since Ferdinand Marcos Jr. was elected president of the Philippines in 2022, he has revived ties with the United States and pushed back against China’s claims to shoals and outcrops near the Philippines. Beijing, in turn, has stepped up coast guard and maritime militia operations to guard its claims.
On Monday, China’s coast guard said that it had started sea rescue training near Scarborough Shoal “to ensure the safety of people onboard vessels that are coming and going.”
Manila has also accused Beijing of taking steps to turn another disputed atoll, Sabina Shoal, which sits about 83 miles northwest of the Philippine island of Palawan, into an artificial island, and it sent a coast guard and a navy ship to the area. On Monday, Beijing rejected the accusation.
The Scarborough Shoal has been under Chinese control since 2012, when Beijing wrested it from Manila in a weekslong standoff. Filipino fishermen had long worked in the resource-rich shoal, but since then their access has been restricted and sporadic.
In 2016, an international tribunal established under the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea rejected China’s expansive claims in the South China Sea and ruled that the shoal is a traditional fishing ground for the Philippines, China and Vietnam. China has ignored that ruling and continued to entrench its control across much of the sea, including Scarborough Shoal.
Atin Ito, the group organizing the Philippine flotilla, is a coalition of religious activists, civic groups and organizations representing fishermen. The name means “This Is Ours,” and the group has sought to galvanize the public behind peacefully asserting the Philippines’ claims in what Manila calls the West Philippine Sea.
Atin Ito held a similar protest last year, sending boats to the Second Thomas Shoal — a disputed atoll, also known as Ayungin Shoal, that is held by Filipino navy personnel on a grounded ship. But those boats turned back after constant shadowing by Chinese vessels, which have used water cannons against Philippine ships that have tried to deliver supplies to the grounded ship.
This time, the Atin Ito mission appears larger and may be bolder. The group said it planned to drop off food and fuel for any Filipino fishing boats in the area. Along the way, the flotilla also began dropping buoys bearing the message “WPS, Atin Ito” — that is, the West Philippine Sea is ours.