Page 24 - Hello Philippines March 2016 'A' issue

24 www.hello-philippines.com INTERNATIONAL AND GLOBAL NEWS March 2016 – No. 05 • UK & Europe Edition
China to secure ‘de facto’ control
of S. China Sea: US admiral
WASHINGTON - China is on its which he warned lawmakers about the an ADIZ,” Harris said. “I’m concerned
way to securing “de facto” control of pace of China’s maritime militarization. about it from the sense that I would to exercise our rights of freedom of Carter said other nations in the
the South China Sea, a top US admiral find that to be destabilizing and navigation in international waters region are responding by stepping up
warned Thursday, amid growing “Harris is raising alarm about what provocative.” and airspace,” Harris said, adding that their own maritime defense activities
unease over Beijing’s continued could happen if there’s not sufficient “like-minded” nations should do the and aligning themselves with the
military build up in the contested push back, that’s what he’s trying to Still, he noted, the United States same. United States.
waterway. provoke here, a more robust response would ignore any such designation.
from the region and outside the Defense Secretary Ashton Carter “Old allies, like Japan, South Korea,
By building air bases and hardened region,” said Bonnie Glaser, a senior Freedom of navigation. General said China’s military presence in the Australia and the Philippines, and then
bunkers on tiny islands, some of Asia advisor at the Center for Strategic Joe Dunford, who is the chairman of South China Sea was increasing the new partners, like Vietnam and India,
which are reclaimed from the sea, and International Studies. “The US the joint chiefs of staff and America’s risk of “miscalculation or conflict” that are working with us increasingly,”
and by installing sophisticated radar cannot do this alone.” top officer, earlier on Thursday told between regional countries. he said.
and missile defense systems, China lawmakers that he worried China
has shown it is determined to achieve China is using dredgers to turn reefs wants to hamper the United States as “Chinese behavior is having The South China Sea is a vital
military primacy in the region, Admiral and low-lying features into larger land it operates in the region. the effect of self-isolation, and it’s waterway through which trillions of
Harry Harris said. masses for runways and other military also galvanizing others to take dollars of cargo flow each year, much
uses to bolster its claims of sovereignty “It’s very clear to me that those action against it,” he told the House of it destined for the United States. n AFP
Beijing’s claims to almost all of the in the region. capabilities that are being developed Appropriations Committee.
South China Sea are widely disputed are intended to limit our ability to / February 25, 2016 / 6:27 pm
and the body of water has long been Satellite imagery released this week move into the Pacific or to operate
viewed as a potential flashpoint. shows Beijing is installing radar gear, freely within the Pacific, and we
and China has also deployed surface- call that anti-access, aerial-denial
“If China continues to arm all of to-air missiles and lengthened a capabilities,” Dunford told the US
the bases they have reclaimed in the runway to accommodate fighter jets on House Appropriations Committee.
South China Sea, they will change the one islet, Woody Island, in the Paracels.
operational landscape in the region,” The United States has repeatedly
Harris told Pentagon reporters. Beijing appears to be preparing said it rejects China’s claims of
what is known as an Air Defense sovereignty in the South China Sea,
“Short of war with the United States, Identification Zone (ADIZ) over the and since October has carried out two
China will exercise de facto control of entire South China Sea, through which high-profile “freedom of navigation”
the South China Sea.” it can militarily query any vessel or operations in which it sailed two
aircraft. warships within 12 nautical miles of
Harris, who heads up the US Pacific islets claimed by China.
Command, visited the Pentagon after “I am concerned about the
several hearings in Washington at possibility that China might declare “We need to, and we must, continue

New N. Korean rocket turns enemy tanks into ‘boiled pumpkin’
NORTH Korea on Saturday boasted of a “He noted with great satisfaction that With a siege mentality bordering on chronic fuel shortages.

newly developed anti-tank weapon that its even the special armoured tanks and cars paranoia, North Korea maintains a huge The shortages are likely to worsen

leader said was so powerful it could turn of the enemies which boast their high military. It has some 1.2 million active when the country is slapped with tough

the most heavily armoured enemy tanks manoeuvrability and striking power are no troops out of a population of around 25 new sanctions the United Nations is

into “boiled pumpkin”. more than a boiled pumpkin before the anti- million—double the size of the armed now weighing over a nuclear test and

Pyongyang’s state media said leader Kim tank guided weapon”, the KCNA news agency. forces in South Korea, which has twice as long-range rocket launch Pyongyang

Jong-Un had watched tests of the portable, Kim called for the weapon to go into many people. conducted earlier this year.

North Korean leader Kim Jong-Un (C) inspects a laser-guided rocket and declared it had the mass production as soon as possible and But most of North Korea’s weapons The UN Security Council sanctions
drill of fighter pilots from the Korean People’s Army
Air Force at an undisclosed location on February “longest firing range in the world”, and was for it to be deployed to frontline units and are outdated and the military is seriously include a ban on the supply of aviation
21, 2016
“as accurate as a sniper’s rifle”. coastal defence units. hamstrung by the impoverished state’s fuel to North Korea. n AFP / February 27, 2016

Thousands flee deadly fighting in southern Philippines
AT least six people have been the scene said clashes continued Decades of violence. A Muslim the clashes was led by followers of recent weeks that the collapse of the
separatist insurgency has raged for Indonesian Ustadz Sanusi, a member of peace deal could embolden hardline
killed and more than 20,000 displaced throughout Friday.
Up to 61 militants were believed to more than four decades on Mindanao the Jemaah Islamiyah who was killed militants who want to resume a violent
during a week of fighting between
Islamic militants and security forces have been killed, although only three and other parts of the southern in the southern Philippines in 2012.
in the southern Philippines, authorities bodies had been recovered, according Philippines, leaving more than 120,000 separatist uprising.

to the military chief with responsibility people dead. Jemaah Islamiyah militants carried Security analysts have also

said Friday. out the 2002 bombings on Indonesia’s warned some Islamic militants in the
Efforts to secure a peace deal with holiday island of Bali, which killed Philippines may want to follow the
Three soldiers and three militants for the area, Colonel Roseller Murillo.
Murillo and other military officials the largest rebel group, the Moro 202 people. The group has long had a more extreme violent tactics of the
were confirmed killed in the clashes,
which involved followers of a slain said they had no firm evidence to Islamic Liberation Front (MILF), presence in the southern Philippines. Islamic State group. n February 26, 2016 /
Indonesian leader of a Southeast Asian confirm the other 58 reported deaths, recently collapsed after congress failed
and would not say how they came up to pass a law that would have created MILF leaders have warned in 11:28 am

militant group, the military said.
“There was attack and counter- with the number other than that they an autonomous Muslim region in
Mindanao.
attack, sniping and counter-sniping, relied on intelligence reports.
The collapse of the previous peace
and artillery fire,” military spokesman The fighting took place in and
Colonel Noel Detoyato told AFP, around Butig, a small Muslim- process in 2008 led hardline MILF
describing the fighting that began on populated town surrounded by heavily commanders to launch attacks on
Saturday with an attack on a military forested mountains. One two-storey Christian villages in Mindanao, which
house was in ruins and many others killed more than 400 people and
post.
The military said the group’s base, a were riddled with bullets, according to displaced 600,000.
This week’s fighting took place in
concrete building on the outskirts of a the local reporter.
More than 20,000 people had a region bordering a stronghold of a
remote town in a mountainous region
of violence-racked Mindanao island, fled their homes, taking refuge in powerful MILF commander.
But military officials said MILF did
had been overrun on Thursday night a mosque, government evacuation
following helicopter gunship attacks. centres and with relatives, according to not take part in this week’s clashes.
They said the group involved in Filipino troops pictured on the southern Philippine island of Mindanao on February 26, 2016
However a local reporter on civil defence officials.