Philippine Marines, National Police officers and Coast Guard members landed on three contested South China Sea features today to assert Manila’s maritime jurisdiction following a similar China Coast Guard action earlier this month, US Naval Institute News reports.
In mid-April, a China Coast Guard team landed at Sandy Cay—known to China as Tiexian Reef—and displayed a Chinese flag in an assertion of Beijing’s “maritime control” and “sovereign jurisdiction” over the sandbar. Manila’s largest South China Sea possession, Thitu Island, also known by the Philippines as Pagasa, lies only a few nautical miles east of Sandy Cay.
The inter-agency maritime operation deployed from Thitu on Sunday morning. Split among four teams on multiple rubber boats, two teams deployed to Sandy Cay 1, while the other two deployed to Sandy Cay 2 and 3, respectively. China Coast Guard cutter 5102 and seven maritime militia vessels were near the sandbars during the operation.
A National Task Force on the West Philippine Sea statement claimed that the mission reinforced “Philippine authorities’ routine and lawful exercise of maritime domain awareness and jurisdiction over the West Philippine Sea.”
A China Coast Guard statement in response to the Sunday morning landings claimed that Chinese officers “boarded the reef to verify and handle the situation in accordance with the law.” No confrontation between Chinese and Philippine Coast Guard personnel was seen in Manila’s media coverage of the mission.
“We urge the Philippines to cease its infringements immediately. The CCG will continue to protect China’s rights and carry out law enforcement activities within China’s jurisdictional waters,” stated China Coast Guard spokesperson Liu Dejun.
A previous confrontation at Sandy Cay occurred in January when Chinese forces blocked a Philippine scientific mission to the sandbars. The incident involved a People’s Liberation Army Navy helicopter utilizing its downwash to disrupt the research team from reaching Sandy Cay.
This latest spat between Manila and Beijing comes amid the latest U.S.-Philippine Balikatan exercise, a series of military drills across the Southeast Asian archipelago that have increased in size, intensity and complexity in recent years as a result of regional tensions in the South China Sea and Taiwan Strait. Last year’s iteration saw the first-ever Balikatan drill to take place on a Philippine South China Sea outpost at Patag Island.
Among 2025’s activities are a Multilateral Maritime Event in the West Philippine Sea, an area of the South China Sea that Manila designates under its exclusive economic zone. A group of U.S., Philippine and Japanese vessels has been conducting drills directly east of Scarborough Shoal, another disputed feature with China, since last Thursday. These vessels include USS Savannah (LCS 28), USS Comstock (LSD 45), BRP Ramon Alcaraz (PS16), BRP Apolinario Mabini (PS36), BRP Gabriela Silang (OPV 8301) and JS Yahagi (FFM 5). Manila previously performed a maritime patrol near Scarborough with Apolinario Mabini (PS 36) that drew condemnation from Beijing.
