PHILIPPINE STAR

US wants to maintain influence in South

China Sea
(Associated Press) | Updated February 16, 2016 - 12:00am

MANILA, Philippines With the symbolic handshakes and unity photo-op, US President Barack
Obamas high-profile summit with Southeast Asian leaders in California today and tomorrow
aims to step up pressure against Chinas increasingly worrisome behavior in disputed waters.

Forging a common front and encouraging bolder rhetoric against Chinese assertiveness in the
South China Sea, however, will be a challenge among the diverse collection of VIP guests, who
did not criticize China by name in past joint summit statements as the disputes flared on and off
in recent years.

We want to make very clear that the United States is going to be at the table and a part of setting
the agenda in the Asia-Pacific in the decades to come, White House deputy national security
adviser Ben Rhodes told reporters last week.

The first day of the summit is scheduled to focus on economic issues and trade, including
discussion of the Trans-Pacific Partnership deal, which includes four of the ASEAN members:
Vietnam, Singapore, Brunei and Malaysia.

ASEAN includes governments aligned either with Washington or Beijing. Only four of its 10
member states are locked in the disputes with China and Taiwan, leading to sometimes
conflicting views on handling the long-simmering rifts.

The regional bloc decides by consensus, meaning just one member can effectively shoot down
any statement detrimental to China.

In recent years, summit statements have expressed concern over the escalating conflicts and
called for freedom of navigation and overflight in the disputed territories, but they have rarely
gone to specifics.

I think it will be hard for the US to convince the 10 ASEAN states to adopt any language on the
South China Sea disputes that go beyond what ASEAN statements have said in the past, said
Malcolm Cook of the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies in Singapore.

Cue from US
The challenge at the summit may be to get all ASEAN countries to agree on a strong statement
on the issue. Analysts say China has put pressure on countries such as Cambodia and Laos not to
sign on.
Pressure from Obama, and a message that the US would continue to engage with the group, may
counteract that.

If the ASEAN leaders feel that the United States is investing in ASEAN ... that would
encourage even the weakest, the most susceptible ASEAN states to sign on with their brothers to
make these statements, said Ernest Bower, an Asia expert at the Center for Strategic and
International Studies.

No one in Southeast Asia wants the Chinese to run roughshod over their smaller neighbors.

With Obama in his last year in office, certain ASEAN member states would probably not
concede on any security or economic issue that might antagonize China, an economic lifeline to
them, Cook said.

A Southeast Asian diplomat said government envoys in the Indonesian capital of Jakarta, where
the ASEAN secretariat is located, have been negotiating the text of a possible joint statement to
be issued by Obama and his Southeast Asian counterparts at the end of the two-day summit,
which opened at the sprawling Sunnylands estate, a resort in California.

There have been initial differences among the governments on the wording of the statement, said
the diplomat, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of a lack of authority to discuss
details of the negotiations with reporters.

Meanwhile, a senior US naval officer said yesterday any move by China to fly jet fighters from
runways on its new man-made islands in the disputed South China Sea would be destabilizing
and would not deter US flights over the area.

Vice Admiral Joseph Aucoin, commander of the US Navys Seventh Fleet, also urged Beijing to
be more open over its intentions in the area, saying it would relieve some of the angst we are
now seeing.

We are unsure where they are taking us, Aucoin said during a briefing with journalists in
Singapore.

Chinese and regional security analysts expect Beijing to start using its new runways in the
disputed Spratlys archipelago for military operations in the next few months.