Chinese Vice Premier cancels Manila visit
MANILA, Philippines - Chinese Vice Premier Li Keqiang has cancelled his official visit to Manila, supposedly set for the first week of September. But the Department of Foreign Affairs clarified the cancellation had nothing to do with the hostage-taking incident that is straining diplomatic relations between the two countries.
Li was supposed to arrive for a three-day visit September 5 to 7. He would have been the first high-level official of any country to visit the two-month-old Aquino government and was hoping to reaffirm his country’s strategic partnership with the Philippines.
In the hierarchy of the Communist Party of China (CPC), Li is set to succeed Wen Jiabao as Premier in the “fifth generation” of the CPC leadership. Premier Wen steps down in 2013.
The Chinese Embassy said it is uncertain for now if Li’s visit will be reset at all, to when and for how long.
DFA Spokesman Ed Malaya said the Chinese Foreign Ministry informed the Philippine Embassy in Beijing about the postponement even before Aug. 23, when the hostage-taking incident took place.
“The visit was postponed in view of the natural disasters that have recently beset China which resulted in many casualties and destruction,” Malaya said in a text message.
The Chinese Embassy confirmed that the Vice Premier decided to forgo the trip to personally handle relief efforts in northwest China’s Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region which was devastated by mudslides last month.
Malaya said the Philippine Embassy received the notice August 20 and that Li likewise postponed his visit to two other member-states of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations.
The visit would have been part of the commemoration of RP-China bilateral relations that entered its 35th year in June.
Chinese President Hu Jintao and former President Gloria Arroyo pledged to break new ground in Philippine-China bilateral relations and increase friendly exchanges as the two countries reaffirm the commitment to move bilateral relations to a higher level of partnership and cooperation.
Li was supposed to meet his counterpart, Vice President Jejomar Binay. A courtesy call on President Aquino was also being arranged. Aside from the state of general relations, Li would be reaffirming his government’s commitment to the framework of cooperation for strategic partnership signed two years ago.
The Philippines was bracing for a discussion on the issue of the disputed South China Sea (SCS), an issue China was expected to raise. In the last ASEAN Regional Forum in Hanoi, the Philippines raised anew the commitment of parties toward adopting a Regional Code of Conduct in the SCS and the reconvening of the ASEAN – China Joint Working Group meeting on the Implementation of the Declaration on the Conduct of Parties in the SCS (DOC).
The Philippines is among five claimants contesting the oil-rich Spratly chain of islands in the SCS. China & Vietnam claim the whole of the SCS, while the Philippines, Malaysia, Brunei and Taiwan lay claim to only a fraction.
Diplomatic relations between the two countries had been shaken following Monday’s hostage-taking incident that killed eight tourists from Hong Kong.
The Chinese Foreign Ministry had turned down a high-level Philippine delegation that was to have left yesterday for Hong Kong and Beijing. The Ministry said they’d rather that the Philippine government first completes its investigation on the hostage crisis as soon as possible.
“On the hostage incident involving Hong Kong tourists, the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Philippine Embassy in Beijing have kept in constant touch. The MFA has emphasized China’s positions to the Philippine side many times. Both sides are keeping in close coordination. We believe that the most urgent task is to have a complete investigation of the matter as soon as possible,” China’s Foreign Ministry Spokesman Jiang Yu said.
A Chinese Foreign Ministry statement on Tuesday said Minister Yang Jiechi talked with his Philippine counterpart, Foreign Secretary Alberto Romulo, over the phone on Monday. Yang urged the Philippine side to rescue and bring the hostages to safety, and expressed how the Chinese government attached great importance to the incident’s quick resolution.
But after the police assault to rescue the hostages, eight of whom were killed, Yang said his government was deeply shocked and strongly condemned the atrocity committed by the hostage-taker against innocent tourists.
“The Chinese side has urged the Philippine side to launch a thorough investigation, provide detailed report to the Chinese side, exert the utmost to save the injured and properly deal with the aftermath of the incident,” the statement said.
China has sent a working team to the Philippines to deal with the aftermath together with the Chinese Embassy. They urged the Philippine government to take concrete measures to ensure the safety and security of the Chinese citizens in the Philippines.
Meanwhile the Philippines said it is still finalizing arrangements for the high-level delegation composed of Binay, Romulo and Presidential Spokesman Edwin Lacierda to proceed to Beijing and Hong Kong.
“While the delegation is ready to leave anytime, there is an understanding between both sides that the Philippine delegation will bring a full report of Monday’s incident,” the DFA statement said in reply to the position made by China on the supposed high level visit to explain what happened and personally deliver the President’s messages when meeting with Chinese leaders in Beijing and Hong Kong.
It was only in the DFA’s latest statement, four days after the tragedy, that the Philippines expressed clear condemnation of what happened.
“The Department of Foreign Affairs reiterates its condemnation of the violence perpetuated by Rolando Mendoza. Nothing could ever justify the senseless act of holding hostage and threatening and carrying out physical violence on innocent civilians including children,” the statement said.
The DFA said the Filipino nation shares the outrage and indignation of all peace-loving peoples of the world over the killing of the Hong Kong hostages.
“We believe that the strong and long-standing ties of friendship and cooperation between the governments and peoples of the Philippines and China and Hong Kong shall overcome this sad episode,” the DFA said in a statement.
(VERA Files is put out by veteran journalists taking a deeper look into current issues. Vera is latin for “true”.)
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canceled before the Aug 23 incident?
"DFA Spokesman Ed Malaya said the Chinese Foreign Ministry informed the Philippine Embassy in Beijing about the postponement even before Aug. 23, when the hostage-taking incident took place"
Ed Malaya, hindi naman kami mga intsik bakit nyo kami niloloko? ngayon nyo lang sinabi na na-cancel yung trip. mga ogag talaga to. sino pang maniniwala sa inyo? panget nyo dumiskarte kahit kelan. obvious naman masyado. pwede namang aminin na dahil sa nangyaring hostage-taking.
Dear Mr. Chinese Vice Premier .....................
If you thinks that you must cancel his trip then so be it.
If it is for the reason of the hijacking / murder or for whatever reason, so be it.
China of all nations in this beautiful world has all reason to act holier then the Pope.
They should look at their own back, front and all side doors first, what they are doing in Nepal makes the murder in Manila look like a walk in the park.
Never mind what they have done the last 20 years in their own country to their own people.
So, Chinese government, switch back a few gears before you start acting like God or try to tell other countries how to run their internal affairs.
Oh I almost forgot, isn’t it the Chinese who let the little North Korean BASTARD dictator do as he pleases and starve his people and let him bring chaos into the South East Asian region.
So who cares what they think.
This will not change anything that it was a terrible think that happened on the bus, but every country that shoots off his mouth to attack the Philippine Government should first clean up their own mess so that they can’t be shoved into it with their own face.
And now Mr. Chinese Vice Premier, stay in China and start feeding your people, start working on flood prevention, start looking at your human right issues, start checking your own police and clean up your own corruption issues.
I better stop now, could go on for about 30 more pages, but I just think they are not worth the time I would spend on it.
what we've done... what we have to do...
The whole country of the Philippines and ALL the citizens in it and around the world have been tarnished by this tragic incident. The excuses and reasons that we now read and see from the politicians, the police, the media, and ordinary citizens just make them even worse.
1. The Media: It's nice for ABSCBN to make their statements. Unfortunately the statements made ended up washing their hands in the end. The best and honourable thing to do right now is to admit our faults. Admission heals and calms. You may admit on the ten faults you made but as soon as you justify even just one, the admission, the sincerity all become useless and unfortunately only fuels the already unstable situation.
2. The Police. From the lowest to the highest rank. – No equipment, no training, no morale, no self-respect, no honor. This is not a put down but all the things that contributed to the tragedy. The best thing I heard was the admission by the few on how ill-prepared they are, how they made the wrong decision, and not saying it’s somebody else’s fault. Unfortunately those who were at fault need to face the consequences. That is the honourable thing to do. The officials need to take those actions. And if the action includes admission of fault at the highest levels, then resignations should be made. Let’s show the world that there is still a little bit of self respect and honor left in our blood.
3. Ordinary citizens (and you picture-hungry policemen). How on earth could you stand in front of that bus and take pictures? How stupid and ignorant could you be?
4. The Politicians:
a. Senators - every time incidents happen your first reaction is always ‘Let’s investigate this’. Aren’t you all tired already of all the investigations that you have started but never finished? Worst of all, aren’t you all ashamed that no justice has been served by all of your investigations? Please look in the mirror and ask that person you see. It’s time that you make our country proud. Make yourselves proud.
b. Mr Congressmen of the opposition, how could you, with straight faces, face the country and make statements that the previous president did better in crisis? The new president has been in the position for two months. The previous, for nine years! What did you see failed? The current administration didn’t hire the SWAT team during the last two months. The current administration didn’t take away their equipment budget, nor ‘untrained’ them in the last two months. How many hundreds of millions of pork barrel money were you getting from the previous president that you pocketed instead of using them to improve the lives of the citizens of this country? Can you honestly say that you have served this country and contributed to make us respected by its own people and honourable around the world?
c. Mr. Lim – Humility is the best policy. We screwed up and that’s the bottom line. Siguro alam mo yung kasabihan, kung sino ang pumutak, iyan ang imitlog.
d. Mr President – I know you inherited everything but unfortunately you are now at the helm. The police failed, the media failed, the politicians failed, your ordinary people failed, and unfortunately, you, your cabinet, and our country failed. It will take a long time to rise up and recover from this. Every action that you make now will be critical. There are a lot of bad and incompetent people around you. But there are a lot of good and competent ones too. You will need to make a lot of difficult and unpopular decisions but they need to be made. Popular presidents are only popular during their terms. But are later remembered as those who stole, corrupt, brought the country to its knees, made the poor poorer and the rich richer. Those who promoted and celebrated that its citizens became OFW’s… whose country does not value human life. You’d rather be unpopular, but be remembered as the one who improved the livelihood of its people, whose skilled citizens wanted to stay instead of escape…
To All. We need to slowly gain back the little respect that we had. We need to show that we are serious with the reform. We need to make people accountable and not just by saying it but by showing that we acted on it. To the politicians who pocketed your millions, give them back so that we can create jobs for Filipinos. So that they don’t need to go to Hongkong to work and clean their toilets (no disrespect meant) and face the anger and humiliation that they are now facing. You all went into politics to make this your means of livelihood and not to serve your country. You and only your actions can prove otherwise. To the police, the worst failure we’ve seen in a long time. Everyone has blamed you and rightly so. You need to pay the consequences, then rise up from all of this. The ones with honor and respect left need to resign. Those who do not have any need to be let go. That includes the incompetent ombudsperson.
To the victims and their families and to the citizens of Hongkong. Philippines and its people failed you. I am deeply ashamed, embarrassed, and sincerely sorry for this tragedy. I am hopeful that those who failed in their duties pay their consequences soon. I am hopeful that immediate actions are taken to prevent this from ever happening again.
I am hopeful that ALL the Filipino people wake up from this and look at ourselves and not to the person across from us. We all know what’s good and bad, what’s patriotic and what’s not, what’s honourable and what is not. One Hundred Million of us can do a lot of good things to make our country proud. ... But we have to start on our own selves...now and not later…
WHO CARES and SO WHAT !!!!!!
I feel sorry for my Country the Philippines.. why are this Chinese people dictating what and which to DO ?? nagpapatunay lang na naghahari at nanatiling namamayagpag ang mga intsik na ito sa loob at labas ng Pilipinas. Panahon na para lumaban at maging Firm sa mga desisyon at paninindigan. Huwag masyadong mag react itong gobyerno ng China sa malaking pagkakamali ng ating bansa, dahil katumbas lang ito ng maraming pagkakamali nila sa pagtrato at pag alila sa mga mahihirap nating kababayan. Kaya na nga nilang Bilhin ang GOBYERNO ng nakaraang administrasyon. When I was growing.. I observed and experience how this Chinese nationals sa DIVISORIA at ONGPIN, kung paano alilain ang mga mahihirap na PINOY...kung paano sila magpayaman sa bansa ng PILIPINAS. Alam niyo ba na sa kaunting puhunan na dala nila galing sa China ay nagiging mayaman na sila kapag dating dito sa Pinas?? Look who owns the BIGGEST mall in ASIA ?? at ilang milyong Domestic Helper ang nagpapakahirap sa HONKONG ?? in other words..inaangkin na ng Chinese ang Dangal at karapatan ng Pilipinas..kaya sa malaking pagkakamali na itoh ng gobyernong Aquino..GUSTO nilang MAsunod sa lahat ng bagay..WRONG !! STAND Firm Philippine Government!! mistakes are made and done..we have to move on and CORRECT what had happened..Don't let this Chinese Delegates Dictate... show them that we can make our own noodles!!
RE:hypocrite and arrogant chinese national
Yeah right cnacel trip to the phillippines have nothing to do with hostage drama who this fool! fooling se how hypocrite the chinese govt. telling there people not to go to phillippines bannening phillippine from its people what a hypocrite because of one fillipino did to there people talking about dirt why dont you chinese national stop mistreatment of abuse and killing tibetan people and give there land talking about worse FREE TIBET! you hypocrite racist chinses fuck.
good news!
mabuti naman para hindi na sila magpahuli ng maraming pusa para sa bwesitang ito. Di na nahiya nag mga ito instik na mga to, Sa HongKong di hamak na mas marami sila inaaping pinoy doon.
Eh, ano naman?
Cancel trip mo! Eh, ano naman! Malay ko magpakawala ka pa ng shabu lab dito. Di lang 8 buhay ng Filipino ang ma biktima.
Baka maniningil lang iyan!
Baka maniningil lang iyan kay Arroyo sa naudlot na NBN deal! O kaya, baka ipagmamalaki niya na marami na silang na occupy na area sa Spratlys!!