China to close its Makati visa office amid planned anti-China protests on July 24 Amid the planned anti-China protests on July 24, the China Embassy announed Monday that it will be closing it visa office in Makati City that day. A notice posted on the embassy’s website said: “The Visa Office of the Consular Section of the Chinese Embassy will be closed on Wednesday, 24 July 2013 for security reasons.” Filipino groups will mount simultaneous protests on Wednesday in Manila and in several countries and capitals where China has a diplomatic mission to denounce what it calls China’s violation of international law and bullying of the Philippines. The Philippines is locked in a long-running dispute with China over the resource-rich South China Sea, where Vietnam, Malaysia, Brunei and Taiwan also have overlapping claims. The Philippines refers to parts of the South China Sea as West Philippine Sea. China claims “indisputable sovereignty” over the waters, where undersea gas deposits have been discovered in several areas. The Philippines lamented that despite numerous attempts to resolve the territorial rifts, Chinese incursions and creeping invasion in its territories near and within the South China Sea have persisted. Philippine officials said this prompted the country to resort to international arbitration to try to declare as illegal China’s massive claim. Among those who pledged to join in the demonstrations are Filipino organizations in the United States, London, Rome, Italy and Israel. The Department of Foreign Affairs said the rallies are a peaceful exercise by Filipinos who wanted their voices heard on the issue. During a news conference last week, Foreign Affairs spokesman Raul Hernandez said “Filipinos have all the right to express and voice out in a peaceful manner their position and sentiments in the issue in the West Philippine Sea.” — RSJ, GMA News gmanetwork/news/story/318566/news/nation/china-to-close-its-makati-visa-office-amid-planned-anti-china-protests-on-july-24
Posted on: Mon, 22 Jul 2013 04:37:43 +0000
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