MANILA (Reuters) – The Philippines said China’s deployment of its largest coast guard vessel inside Manila’s exclusive economic zone was alarming and clearly meant to intimidate fishermen operating around a contested shoal in the South China Sea.
“We were surprised about the increasing aggression being showed by the People’s Republic of China in deploying the monster ship,” National Security Council spokesperson Jonathan Malaya said in a press conference.
(Reporting by Mikhail Flores and Karen Lema; Editing by John Mair)
