The Philippines signed a troop agreement with New Zealand to allow both nations’ militaries to hold large-scale exercises in each other’s territories and enhance their bilateral defense relations amid the “deteriorating” security environment in the Indo-Pacific region. (via Martin Sadongdong | MB)
READ: https://mb.com.ph/2025/4/30/ph-new-zealand-sign-visiting-forces-deal-amid-deteriorating-security-environment
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READ: https://mb.com.ph/2025/4/30/ph-new-zealand-sign-visiting-forces-deal-amid-deteriorating-security-environment
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NewsTranscript
00:00The best motivating factor in human terms, in real terms, for us going together is China's overreach.
00:08The Chinese Communist Party's overreach.
00:11And I stress this because their actions have resulted in a great damage to the goodwill that the Chinese people should have in the whole world.
00:26Just because of, you know, a grand vision for what they should be and continuing the legitimization of the dictatorship of the party.
00:43Now, in terms of their actions, that is what I appeal to our countrymen to do.
00:52Please do not give so much weight into what they say.
01:00Because as I said before, they propagandize and they don't communicate.
01:07There's a big difference between propagandizing and communicating.
01:12And let's judge them by what they do and not what they say.
01:16So it gives them certainty and to their legal status.
01:21It is not unique to the Philippines.
01:23We've gone up with other countries and we're increasing that activity to make our operability and interoperability much more enhanced.
01:33In terms of anything else, I think that we're just seeing, basically, we have undertaken work with the Australians, the U.S. and others.
01:43And we're just going to continue doing the work we do around the law of the sea and also around the rules-based order.
01:50And as a maritime nation, we appreciate the ability to be able to sail in international waters.
01:55Added to this is the ability for our armed forces and other members of the VETS establishment to have familiarity with each other, to interoperate.
02:09And as an action in an armed force is the more you trade together, the more trust and confidence is built.
02:17And this is not only for defensive purposes, but more importantly, since both New Zealand and the Philippines are in the ring of fire, it will help interoperability in terms of HABR between our troops.
02:37And it will also allow the New Zealand and Philippine armed forces to interact with other troops in the Philippines and elsewhere, for example, in Australia, in Japan, and of course, in the United States.