China opposes ‘3rd party’ investigator in Recto Bank incident

CHINA has thumbed down President Rodrigo Duterte’s proposal to allow a “third party” investigator to look into the June 9 incident at Recto (Reed) Bank that left 22 Filipino fishermen in distress at sea, Malacañang announced Monday, July 1.

Speaking to Palace reporters, Presidential Spokesperson Salvador Panelo said Chinese President Xi Jinping’s administration does not want an intervention by a neutral country.

“Sumagot na ang China. Ang sabi nila, doon sa una nag-offer sila ng joint investigation. Nag-offer sila ng joint investigation, ‘di ba tapos in-accept ni Presidente, tapos may third party. Ang sabi naman nila, huwag na ‘yung third party,” the Palace official said.

(China has responded. They reponded to the initial offer to conduct a joint investigation with the Philippines. They suggested a joint investigation and the President accepted on condition that there will be a third party. They opposed the proposal to have a third party.)

“Kailangan tayo lang ang mag-usap doon. Iyan ang recent (The matter should be settled between the Philippines and China. That’s the recent update),” he added.

On June 9, Chinese trawler Yuemaobinyu 42212 rammed Filipino fishing vessel F/B Gem—ver1, causing it to partly sink. The Chinese then abandoned the 22 Filipino crew, who had to hold on to pieces of wood for several hours to survive.

China on June 20 proposed a joint investigation by Manila and Beijing to come up with “mutually-recognized results.”

Two days after Beijing made the proposal, Duterte accepted the offer and sought the creation of a three-man joint investigating panel composed of one representative each from the Philippines, China and a “neutral” nation.

Panelo, however, noted that China’s latest proposal was just to “exhange” findings of separate investigations conducted by Beijing and Manila.

“Ang feeling nila, kung meron tayong mga separate investigation, then let’s meet. Kailangan mag-create ka ng task force sa’yo at sa amin, and then we exchange our findings and then we decide kung ano na ang gagawin natin dito,” he said.

(Their proposal is that we meet after our separate investigations. Each country needs to create a task force and then we exchange our findings and resolve the issue.

Investigation

Panelo said the executive department saw nothing wrong with the proposal, unless the results of the separate investigations are conflicting.