AFP/Manila
The Philippines will offer three oil and gas exploration contracts in the disputed South China Sea, including two in areas claimed by China, an official said.
All three blocs off the coast of the western Philippine island of Palawan are part of Philippine territory, energy undersecretary Jose Layug said, dismissing China’s territorial claims.
Tensions between the Philippines and China over the South China Sea have been running high due to disputes over the Reed Bank and the Spratly islands to the south of the prospects, and Scarborough Shoal to the north.
But Layug dismissed suggestions the latest quarrel, over the shoal, would dampen interest in the bid.
“Historically, the Philippines has always attracted bids from medium-sized exploration companies. They do seismic surveys, and if they have (good) results, that’s when the big boys come in,” Layug said.
The two disputed areas for exploration are just beside the Philippines’ existing natural gas fields, while the third lies closer to the Palawan coast.
China claims nearly all of the South China Sea even up to the coast of its neighbours. Four foreign firms—Australia’s Nido Petroleum, Spain’s Repsol, GDF Suez of France and Italy’s Eni—are among 40 companies that have met official requirements to submit bids.
But Layug said he did not know if any of them would make offers for the contracts, which are expected to be awarded within six months, with each of the projects to involve spending hundreds of millions of dollars over upto seven years.
Philex Petroleum, one of the pre-qualified bidders, is known to have held talks earlier this year with representatives of state-owned China National Offshore Oil Corp.
While CNOOC is not taking part, Layug said it would be welcome to enter into a partnership with any of the winning bidders.
“They are always welcome to take part in any of our service contracts for as long as they recognise Philippine law,” he said.
The Philippines and China entered into a tense stand-off over the Scarborough Shoal in April when Chinese patrol vessels blocked the Philippine Navy from arresting Chinese fishermen.
Last year, the Philippines accused China of harassing an oil exploration ship at the potentially oil-rich Reed Bank.
The Philippines said yesterday it had summoned Cambodia’s ambassador to explain comments he made accusing it and Vietnam of playing “dirty politics” in trying to solve a maritime row with China.
The move appeared to further deepen divisions within the 10-nation Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean), more than two weeks after a ministerial meeting hosted by Cambodia ended in disarray over the sea dispute.
Foreign Department spokesman Raul Hernandez said Cambodian ambassador Hos Sereythonh was asked to personally explain his comments, but he failed to turn up claiming he was sick.
“We will continue to summon him until he is able to come,” Hernandez said in a statement.
“We want him to explain what he meant when he stated that the ‘inflexible and non-negotiable position of two countries of Asean is dirty politics’.”
The comments were in a letter Hos sent to the editor of the Philippine Star, one of the country’s leading newspapers, on Monday.
In the letter, Hos accused the Philippines and Vietnam of working to “sabotage and hijack the joint communique” during the Asean meeting.
Hos argued that the Philippines and Vietnam should not blame Cambodia for Asean’s failure to issue an end-of-meeting statement spelling concerns in the region, a first in its 45 year history.
Hos accused the two countries of playing “dirty politics”.
Hernandez yesterday charged that Cambodia, a close ally of China, rejected at least five final drafts of the joint statement that would have addressed the maritime row.
Diplomats had said the Philippines called on its fellow Asean members at the Cambodia meeting to support it against China.
Indonesia’s foreign minister subsequently launched a mission to save the bloc’s ‘cohesiveness’, resulting in a belated statement affirming commitments to a proposed ‘code of conduct’ over the South China Sea.
Hos could not be reached for comment yesterday.
3 comments:
The Cambodians dogs defending China and will keep Cambodia on to the battle field between Asian and China .Who win from the war?youn?Siam?khmers?the history repeat it self
it's regretful that the philipines become unruly and force their bilateral issue with china onto asean agenda. i don't think that's right for the philipines and vietnam/youn who is sort of hiding behind the philipines' emotional tantrum like this. apparently the philipines, pushing this issue onto the throat of cambodia, is not ethical and unruly. so what if cambodia is a good ally of china. someone got to be an ally of cambodia, especially if other hateful or biased countries left a void in cambodia, of course, someone else like china, who has nothing against cambodia will fill that void, you know. don't they know that is cambodia's right to be allied and be loved by others as well! the philipines act like cambodia owed their country something, not! i wonder who is the philipines allied with? shame on the philipines for being biased, prejudice and discriminatory even in this day and age. shame shame on the philipines for not respecting asean's rule and regulations and for pushing cambodia around as if cambodia owed them something. if they summoned the khmer diplomat, i think cambodia should complain and protest the philipines unethical conduct by doing them a favor with their diplomat in cambodia as well. apparently the philipines is using their wrangling with china on cambodia, accusing and violating cambodia's right to be friends with all countries. sorry, cambodia cannot take side with the philipines with their vietnamese robbers hiding behind them. no can do, ok!
what the greedy philipino whining about here, there and everywhere, really! why don't they go whine at china and hope china will nuke them, really.
Post a Comment