China’s leaders planning separate visits to the Philippines: envoy

September 5, 2017

Chinese President Xi Jinping is planning to make his first state visit to the Philippines next year while Chinese Premier Li Keqiang will fly to the country for an official visit and to attend the ASEAN summit in November, Beijing's top envoy to Manila said.

Chinese Ambassador Zhao Jianhua spoke for the first time about the incident involving Manila and Beijing at Sandy Cay in the disputed West Philippine Sea, saying "that issue has been successfully addressed through diplomatic channels."

"Don't worry," Zhao told journalists at a diplomatic reception Monday evening, referring to the reported deployment of Chinese Navy, Coast Guard ships and a flotilla of paramilitary fishing forces near Sandy Cay, a strip of sandbars near the Philippine-occupied Pag-asa Island.

Foreign Secretary Alan Peter Cayetano said without elaborating the issue has been resolved diplomatically by the Philippines and China. .

"Ever since President Duterte took office, our relationship has dramatically improved. Relations, cooperations have entered into a new era, so we need to continue to properly handle the disputes that we have," Zhao said.

Li is going to participate in the ASEAN summit meetings in Manila in November and pay an official visit to the Philippines, the first visit by a Chinese premier in about 10 years, Zhao said.

"President Duterte has been to China twice and it's time for our president to come," Zhao said. The date of Xi's visit is still being finalized, but Zhao said "definitely he will come."

"It is going to be hugely significant, it's going to be very, very fruitful," Zhao said of Xi's Philippine visit.

While the vastly improved relations benefit both countries, Zhao said they "benefit the Philippines in particular," saying Philippine trade with China has increased by more than 20 percent, the largest increase among Manila's trading partners and elevating China as the country's number one trading partner, Zhao said.

"What is more important, which is quite mutually beneficial to the farmers here, the increase of tropical fruits, banana, pineapple that have been exported to China has increased by 50 percent since the beginning of this year and the tourists coming to the Philippines increased by nearly 40 percent," Zhao said.

"That now stands about 750,000...By the end of this year, the growth rate will exceed one million people, despite the troubles you have in the south," Zhao said, referring to the ongoing Marawi City siege.

Duterte took steps to mend ties with China after he won the presidency in June last year while berating  the US , for criticizing his deadly war against illegal drugs.

An international arbitration tribunal in The Hague said  in July 12 2016 it nullified Beijing's claims to nearly the entire South China Sea.

China did not participate in the arbitration, which ruled based on the 1982 United Nations Convention on the Law of the Seas, or UNCLOS, an international treaty which China, the Philippines and more than 150 other countries have signed.

Instead of pressing China to comply, Duterte decided to set aside the decision but promised to raise it with China at an unspecified time in his six-year presidency.

"So if you look at the bilateral relationship, I would like you to look at those parts that benefit and will continue to benefit the people of both sides," Zhao told reporters. "We do have trouble but (it's a) tiny part only. We need not to focus on it and we should (not) let those disputes jeopardize the overall relationship of the two countries." DMS