President to sail to PH Rise for launch of plateau research

PRESIDENT Rodrigo Duterte will set foot in the Philippine (Benham) Rise next week to send off 50 scientists who will conduct research in the area, Malacañang said on Tuesday.

The Philippine Rise is an underwater plateau near Aurora province in Luzon, the country’s biggest group of islands. The President will be commemorating last year’s renaming of Benham Rise to Philippine Rise by visiting the area itself on May 15-16.

The visit will coincide with the

conducted by around 50 scientists,

Palace spokesman Harry Roque said in a news briefing.

“The event will be attended by 50 scientists whom the President will be sending off as they start their scientific research in the Philippine Rise,” Roque added.

He said all 50 scientists are Filipinos.

President Rodrigo Duterte said on April 26 that he is planning to set sail to the Philippine Rise to reiterate the claim of the Philippines to the disputed area.

In a speech during the 102nd Annual Communication of the Most Worshipful Grand Lodge of the Free and Accepted Masons in the Philippines in Davao City, Duterte announced that he will proceed to the Philippine Rise to make a statement that it is owned solely by the Philippines.

The seismically active plateau is also contested by China.

“Nobody owns this place [ but us], including the continental shelf, the underground landmass that extends under the sea,” Duterte said in a speech during the gathering of the masons.

If need be, he added, he will go to war to defend the disputed underwater plateau.

“We are an independent nation… and there [ are] so many ships doing explorations [ there]” the President said.

“And when this crucial question was asked of me, ‘ What will you do if they also claim it?’ I said, ‘ I will go to war.’ And I will go to war, believe me,” Duterte added.

The United Nations in 2012 declared the Philippine Rise as an extension of the Philippines’ continental shelf.

This is not the first time that Duterte threatened to wage a war against any country that will explore the Philippine Rise.

“If anybody, any country for that matter, would say that they’d want to try and experiment there without our permission and, worse, begin exploration talks here at the Benham or Philippine Rise, I will not allow it, and it will mean war,” the President said in a speech on March 1.

Roque, however, said the strong words of Duterte were not directed at China.

Early this year, the Department of Foreign Affairs ( DFA) granted a request of the Institute of Oceanology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences for a marine scientific research in Eastern Luzon and Eastern Mindanao.

A similar request by Frenchbased non- profit organization Tara Expeditions was declined by the DFA, according to Magdalo party-list Re p . Gary Alejano.

Shortly after, Duterte ordered the termination of all requests from foreign entities to conduct research in the area.

This is to allow only Filipinos to conduct scientific research, lay submarine cables and explore resources in the Philippine Rise.

The move, however, did not mean a total ban, Roque clarified.

Jay Batongbacal, a maritime law expert and a professor at the University of the Philippines, later bared that China named five undersea features in the 13- million- hectare underwater plateau.

But Roque downplayed the naming of the features, saying it does not mean China is already their owner.

He said the Philippine government would object and not recognize the Chinese names and that the Philippine Embassy in Beijing had raised the concern with China.

The embassy is considering a recommendation to notify the International Hydrographic Organization ( IHO) about the action taken by the Philippines.

The IHO had approved China’s application to rename the five features.