Navy may engage foreign defense attaches on ships seeking clearance when passing Philippine waters

August 28, 2019

The Philippine Navy may engage defense attaches of different states following the directives of President Rodrigo Duterte that all foreign ships should seek clearance before they could enter the country's territorial waters. 

"With the guidance of the president that all ships entering our territorial waters should ask permission we can engage our defense and armed forces attache that they should inform us, just like what the United States has been doing to Malaysia, Indonesia," Navy Flag Officer in Command Vice Admiral Robert Empedrad told reporters Wednesday.

Empedrad said the Philippine Navy is  finalizing rules of engagement to define an unfriendly manner of implementing Duterte's order.

"We are still finalizing the Navy's concept or rules of engagement to define the unfriendly gesture mentioned by the president," he said.

"We will shadow it until it leaves our territorial waters, we continuously challenge the ship but if it failed to respond or if it turned off its AIS (Automatic Identification System), then probably we can send aircraft to shadow and then take picture of the ship," he stated.

"If they still fail to answer probably we can, our ship can cross his bow, not necessarily provocative because what is provocative is when you do the general quarters. It means your ship is ready for war, we will not be doing that, just manuevering to tell them that, continuously tell them they are passing through our territorial waters," he added.

It can be recalled that following reported incursions of Chinese warship within the territorial waters, Duterte required all foreign ships to seek clearance before passing Philippine waters.

The Palace said failure to comply with Duterte's directive will force the Philippines to act in an unfriendly manner.

Empedrad explained that the order of Duterte requiring foreign ships to seek permission before entering Philippine waters is not a violation of the United Nations Convention for the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS).

"AIS is not part of the UNCLOS, because when the innocent passage was made there is no AIS yet. But as courtesy when you enter territorial waters of other nation, you should not turn off your AIS because that is what we also do when we do innocent passage," he said.

"If we come up with a local rule, it does not mean it will supercede the international rule because the territorial waters is like your house. For example, you have visitors. Of course, your rules should be followed. If the president said they should seek clearance we will engage the defense attache and tell them they need to inform us every time their ships passing our waters and they should follow that," he added. Robina Asido/DMS