Palace shrugs off China's comments vs Phl in UN meeting

MANILA, Philippines — Malacañang is not worried about China's accusation against the Philippines during a recent meeting of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS).

Presidential Communication Operations Office head Herminio Coloma Jr. sees nothing wrong with China's move to engage the Philippines on media level before the international community.

"It is part of the dynamics of international relations to conduct information campaigns or to propagate a national policy by utilizing the mass media as a channel of communication. So we are not unduly perturbed by this action," Coloma said in a press briefing.

During the 24th meeting of state parties of the UNCLOS, China's Deputy Permanent Representative Wang Min accused the Philippines of deceiving the international community regarding the South China Sea dispute to win the sympathy of other countries.

Read: China: Philippines getting int'l sympathy through deception

Coloma refused to respond to Wang's statement, saying the Palace will just wait for the Department of Foreign Affairs’ report on the matter.

"[T]his would have been monitored by our permanent representative to the United Nations and it will be more appropriate to comment once the report has been officially verified," Coloma said.

The Palace official also does not see the need to launch a media offensive to clarify the Philippines' position in the sea dispute.

He said the country's views have been reported by international media organizations, which conducted interviews with President Benigno Aquino III.

"Hindi naman siguro kailangang maglunsad niyan sapagkat nakikita naman natin na mayroong mataas na antas ng pagiging interesado ang mga major mass media organizations at sila mismo ang nagsisikap na malaman ang posisyon ng Pilipinas," Coloma said.

"Ipinapakita lamang nito na nagkakaroon ng traction ang ating katwiran hinggil sa pagpapairal ng international rule of law, at dahil dito, pinapansin ito ng pandaigdigang komunidad, hindi lamang ng mga kagawad ng mass media," he added.