The United States’ top envoy to the Philippines on Monday warned against changing the status quo in the disputed South China Sea and other contested areas in the region and called on all rival nations to adhere to international law.
Defying China’s position against Washington’s involvement in the disputes, US Ambassador Philip Goldberg maintained that it is in America’s national interest to ensure free access to the resource-rich waters and that conflicts are resolved peacefully even though it is not a party to the disputes.
The US, along with other Western nations expressed alarm over China’s unilateral imposition of a fisheries regulation in the South China Sea, which Beijing claims nearly in its entirety, and an air defense zone in the neighboring East China Sea, where a group of islands is jointly disputed by China and Japan.
“We reject unilateral attempts to alter the realities on the ground, the air or the sea,” Goldberg said at a briefing for foreign correspondents.