Officials from Philippines, China to meet on stalled South China Sea joint oil exploration deal: senator

Foreign affairs and energy officials from Beijing and Manila are looking to break the impasse on the deal, according to Senator Sherwin Gatchalian

Negotiations had foundered over which country’s laws should govern exploration activities in the Reed Bank, where they have overlapping claims

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A reef in the South China Sea, where the Philippines and China have overlapping claims. Photo: AFP

Published: 7:17pm, 7 Jan 2020Updated: 8:32pm, 17 Feb 2020

Top foreign affairs and energy officials from Beijing and Manila will meet soon to break the impasse on the proposed joint oil exploration deal in the South China Sea, according to Senate energy committee chair Sherwin Gatchalian.

There had been an impasse during the October 2019 meeting in Beijing over “how to move forward and which laws should govern over the joint exploration”, Gatchalian said, quoting Philippine Department of Energy officials who had given him an informal briefing.

“Of course our side, especially the Department of Energy, is citing that [the Reed Bank area] is within our exclusive economic zone, therefore our laws should govern it,” the senator said. “I think that was the impasse because the Chinese side did not agree on that.”

The same legal impasse had stopped a proposed oil exploration deal in 2011 between Beijing and the administration of former president Benigno Aquino III.

In 2018, the government of President Rodrigo Duterte tried a different tack by first agreeing to form two groups to fast-track negotiations: the China-Philippines Inter-Governmental Joint Steering Committee on Cooperation on Oil and Gas Development, co-chaired by the respective foreign ministers, and an Inter-Entrepreneurial Working Group on Oil and Gas Development.

State-owned China National Offshore Oil Corporation (CNOOC) was Beijing’s official representative for the second group.

Overlapping claims in the South China Sea. Graphic: SCMP

Gatchalian said a successful deal would send a strong message to the world that “we can find a commercial solution that will favour or benefit both countries despite the geopolitical issues. We can show the world and our people that we are working together.”