Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte on Monday visited Chinese warships docked in his home town and raised the prospect of future joint exercises, highlighting fast-warming relations despite competing claims in the South China Sea.
Duterte made his visit a day after issuing a chairman’s statement on behalf of the 10-nation Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) bloc that took a soft stance toward Chinese expansionism and island-building in the waterway.
The Philippine leader praised the guided missile destroyer Chang Chun as “very impressive.”
“It’s all carpeted inside. It’s like a hotel,” he enthused after being presented with a Chinese naval cap.
“This is part of confidence-building and goodwill, and to show we are friends and that is why I welcome them here,” Duterte said of the three-vessel flotilla that arrived in Davao City on Mindanao island on Sunday.
Asked about possible joint exercises between the Philippines and China, Duterte said: “Yes, I said I agree. There can be joint exercises.”
He suggested they should be held in the southern Philippines, perhaps in the Sulu Sea where pirates have been active in recent months.
Duterte, elected last year, has distanced himself from traditional longtime ally the US. He has played down his country’s territorial dispute with China in favor of seeking greater economic aid and investment from it.
China has sparked regional concern by turning reefs and shoals in contested areas into artificial islands, installing military facilities and airstrips on some of them.
But in the statement issued after he hosted the ASEAN summit in Manila, Duterte merely took note of “concerns expressed by some leaders over recent developments in the area.”
He ignored last year’s international ruling outlawing China’s sweeping claims to the key waterway.

Source: Arab News