Diplomacy to resolve WPS issue, we don’t want war, says solon

SENATE Deputy Majority Leader Joseph Victor ‘JV’ Ejercito calls for an amicable resolution on the Philippines’ dispute with China on the West Philippine Sea.

“We still have to keep our lines open and exhaust all diplomatic means. We do not want war,” Ejercito said during the Kapihan sa Senado forum on Tuesday, December 19, 2023. The senator also responded to questions about the proposed 2024 General Appropriations Act, discussions on Charter change, legislative priorities, and other pressing issues.

On Tuesday, President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. said that the Philippines is eyeing a “paradigm shift” as the “traditional methods of diplomacy” of the Philippine government is continuously being disregarded by China amid its recent aggression and harassment in the West Philippine Sea (WPS).

In an interview with Japanese media on Saturday, President Marcos emphasized that it is about time for the Philippine government to come up with a new way on how to deal with China as it appeared that the current efforts are showing “very little progress.”

Marcos described the current diplomatic efforts with China as heading “in a poor direction.”

“Well, to this point, we have resorted to the traditional methods of diplomacy where, should there be an incident, we send note verbal. Our embassy will send a démarche to the Foreign Affairs (Ministry) office in Beijing, but we have been doing this for many years now, with very little progress,” Marcos said.

“We have to do something what we have not done before. We have to come up with a new concept, a new principle, a new idea so that we move, as I say, we move the needle the other way. It’s going up, let’s move the needle back, so that paradigm shift is something that we have to formulate,” he added.