Noynoy is really coming off as a wimp — despite the confrontational stance he and his Foreign secretary, Albert del Rosario, took at the Asean (Association of Southeast Asian Nations) Summit that was a total failure, with the Asean foreign ministers unable to even come up with a joint communiqué in its 45 years of existence.
A Chinese naval frigate which was left stranded for at least four days in Half Moon Shoal ended up with a Chinese fishing vessel coming to its rescue for the refloating of the naval frigate. There was not a pip from the Philippine government that even said it was not going to lodge any protest against China, with all of these officials chorusing that this was merely an accident caused by human error.
Amazing, since there has been no investigation at all from the Philippine side, yet its conclusion was that the Chinese naval accidental foray in the shoal, which certainly was well within the Philippines’ territorial waters, was an accident caused by human error.
Moreover, the Noynoy government didn’t even bother to question why the frigate hit the country’s territorial waters, but merely judged it as an accident.
Defense Chief Voltaire Gazmin said the Chinese frigate apparently made a navigational mistake that caused it to run aground.
He said there appeared to be no signs that it was on a mission to intrude in a Philippine-claimed area, noting the absence of structures on the shoal.
“It may have been human error. The CO (commanding officer) may have not seen the rocks,” he said.
Gazmin easily concluded this, despite the fact that the Philippine military — or at least its Navy and Malacañang didn’t even know that there was a Chinese naval frigate that had made a “navigational mistake” causing it to run aground. It took the media to report what the Australian newspaper had already reported.
But the Philippines said Sunday it will not lodge a diplomatic protest after China extricated a naval frigate from a disputed South China Sea shoal where it had been stranded for four days.
Likely an accident, said Del Rosario. Likely? The country’s diplomat didn’t even bother to get a representative to check with the Chinese Embassy how it got into the so-called “accident?” And worse, the Philippines did not even ask for an explanation as to why the frigate was well within the country’s territorial waters. A typhoon couldn’t possibly have been the reason for the frigate to be right smack in Philippine waters.
And to think the Aquino government didn’t even bother to get China to apologize, if indeed it was an accident.
The Chinese Embassy certainly gave no explanation at all. Neither did China offer any sort of apology.
What the Chinese Embassy merely said was that the frigate was “refloated successfully” before daybreak Sunday, and Del Rosario said he had been informed it was already en route back to China.
“We wish its crew a safe voyage back to China,” he said.
Del Rosario also said that he doesn’t  believe that there “were ill-intentions that accompanied the presence of that ship in our EEZ (exclusive economic zone).”
Yet the frigate was reportedly on “routine patrol” when it got stranded Wednesday on the shoal.  Patrolling Philippine waters?
So meek Noynoy and Del Rosario are, compared to their position at the Asean Summit where the latter accused China of “duplicity and intimidation,” for not including the Philippine problem with China on the disputed islands, which position caused the non-issuance of the Asean joint communiqué.
The Noynoy administration and its diplomats really have a lot to learn in dealing with such problems.
Where there was need for real diplomacy in the Asean Summit, the Philippines took a bulldog stance in insisting on certain statements included in a communiqué while hurling insulting words.
But where a diplomatic protest should have been lodged against China, for the foray of the naval frigate, they turned tail, proving them to be certified wimps.