China warns Philippines to be cautious over South China Sea

BANGKOK (AP) — China said Foreign Minister Wang Yi warned his Philippines counterpart in a phone call about alleged interference in their nations' relationship and urged the Philippines to act with caution in their South China Sea dispute.

Philippine Secretary of Foreign Affairs Theresa Lazaro said she and Wang had “a frank and constructive” discussion on the direction of their bilateral relationship in the call Tuesday night. “Both sides emphasized the need for continued diplomatic dialogue and the proper management of differences anchored on mutual respect,” Lazaro said in a post on X without elaborating.

China and the Philippines have overlapping claims to the South China Sea, which have escalated into physical clashes between sailors and collisions between navy vessels in recent years. The tensions over their territorial claims have surfaced in their diplomatic exchanges lately.

Wang said the bilateral relationship was facing “malicious interference” by certain Filipino politicians, and that the Philippines should “strengthen restraints on the relevant people, and speak with a unified, reasonable voice on policy towards China," according to a statement from China's Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

Wang also said the Philippines should be “cautious in their words and deeds” on the issue of the South China Sea.

The call came after a tense back and forth between the sides in recent weeks. The Philippines defense secretary called China a “troublemaker” in the region. In response, China's ambassador to the Philippines said it was nonsense, but that “if we want to use force, we may easily win. But no, we will not choose force and we love peace.”

Those remarks ignited a strong response from the Philippines, including President Ferdinand Marcos Jr., who said the statement sounded like a threat.

Despite the strong warning from the Chinese side, both sides agreed that they would keep talking, according to the Chinese statement.

Another topic raised between the two diplomats was the possible resumption of long-stalled talks between the Philippines and China on a proposed joint oil and gas exploration in the Reed Bank, according to a Philippine official, who spoke to the Associated Press on condition of anonymity because of a lack of authority to discuss the matter publicly.

The offshore area is claimed by both Beijing and Manila but lies within the exclusive economic zone of the Philippines. The economic zone is a 200-nautical-mile (370-kilometer) stretch of water from a country’s coastline where it has exclusive rights to explore and harness resources under the 1982 United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea.

Philippine efforts to explore for oil and gas in the Reed Bank have been hampered for years because of opposition from Beijing, which claims sovereignty over the area along with most of the South China Sea.

Vietnam, Malaysia, Brunei and Taiwan have also been involved in the increasingly tense territorial standoffs in the sea, a key global trade route.

Associated Press journalist Jim Gomez in Manila, Philippines, contributed to this report.