A Chinese warship accidentally collided with its own coast guard vessel amid dangerous blocking manoeuvres in the South China Sea, a Philippine Coast Guard official says.
The country released a dramatic video of the skirmish in the Scarborough Shoal, a rich fishing atoll off the northwestern Philippines.
Coast Guard commodore Jay Tarriela said Chinese coast guard ships chased and staged dangerous blocking manoeuvres against Philippine coast guard and fishing vessels.
A Philippine coast guard ship managed to evade being hit by a Chinese coast guard water cannon during the melee, he said.
While chasing a Philippine coast guard vessel, a Chinese coast guard ship accidentally collided with a Chinese navy ship, Tarriela said.
The Chinese coast guard ship sustained “substantial damage” and the Philippine coast guard offered to provide help, including medical assistance, to the Chinese side, he said.
China confirmed the confrontation took place and accused the Philippines of "forcibly intruding" into its waters, but did not mention the apparent collision, the BBC reports.
The morning's headlines in 90 seconds, including poll numbers paint grim picture for leaders, Trump sending the National Guard into Washington, and where have all the coaches gone? (Source: 1News)
It’s the latest flare-up of long-simmering territorial disputes in the South China Sea, a key global trade route, where overlapping claims between China and the Philippines have escalated in recent years.
Vietnam, Malaysia, Brunei and Taiwan also lay claims to parts of the contested waters.
Both China and the Philippines claim Scarborough Shoal and other outcroppings in the South China Sea. China seized the shoal, which lies west of the main Philippine island of Luzon, in 2012 and has since restricted access to Filipino fishermen there.
A 2016 ruling by an international arbitration court found that most Chinese claims in the South China Sea were invalid, but Beijing refuses to abide by it.
Additional reporting by 1News
SHARE ME