Speaking to the press at the end of the US-Philippines-Japan summit in Washington, DC on April 12, Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr urged former president Rodrigo Duterte to clarify what the “secret agreement” he entered into with China and what he purportedly compromised in that agreement.
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NewsTranscript
00:00 "Go, go, I'll talk to the former officials and the civil..."
00:03 Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr.
00:05 labeled the so-called "Gentleman's Agreement"
00:07 between the previous administration and China
00:10 as a secret deal that is deliberately hidden from the public.
00:14 "A Gentleman's Agreement was reached during the Duterte administration..."
00:19 Marcos was asked about the agreement in a press conference
00:22 at the end of his three-day visit to the United States on Friday.
00:26 "With the confirmation of the Chinese embassy,
00:30 we now know that there was a secret agreement.
00:34 Now, this is the second question that I have,
00:36 is what is contained in that secret agreement?"
00:40 He urged the media and public to pressure his predecessor,
00:43 Rodrigo Duterte, to clarify the pact.
00:46 "Whatever foreign policy we undertook vis-à-vis South China Sea,
00:50 West Philippine Sea,
00:52 was just continuing our foreign policy of maintaining the peace
00:58 and promoting the national interest.
01:01 It was the secret agreement, gentlemanly or otherwise,
01:08 was not... we were not informed about it.
01:11 So, you should... can you please...
01:14 I ask members of all our media,
01:18 can you go to the former officials in the Duterte administration
01:24 and ask them who were the cabinet secretaries,
01:27 who knows about this,
01:28 what was the process and what happened?"
01:31 Last month, Duterte's former spokesman, Harry Roque,
01:35 said Duterte and China had a deal to maintain the status quo
01:38 in the West Philippine Sea,
01:40 which is to refrain from building and repairing any structure in the area.
01:45 On Friday, the Chinese embassy in Manila
01:47 confirmed the gentlemen's agreement,
01:49 saying that it had effectively helped maintain overall peace and stability
01:53 in the Iong-gin Shoal.
01:55 They said the agreement was followed
01:57 in the beginning of the Marcos administration,
01:59 but had ceased since February last year.
02:03 Duterte denied conceding anything to China in the agreement,
02:06 and he said what his administration did was to maintain the status quo.
02:10 [BLANK_AUDIO]
02:20 [BLANK_AUDIO]