Chinese FM calls for end to politicization of S. China Sea issue

Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi attends a press conference after the meeting between Chinese Foreign Minister and the counterparts from 10 ASEAN members in Vientiane, Laos, July 25, 2016. [Photo/Xinhua]

VIENTIANE - Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi has called for an end to the political manipulation and sensationalization of the South China Sea issue.

Wang also urged related parties to get back to the right track of implementing the Declaration on the Conduct of Parties in the South China Sea (DOC), which was signed in November 2002 as a code of conduct for all parties involved in the South China Sea issue.

Wang made the call at a press briefing Monday following his meeting with the foreign ministers of the member countries of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) -- Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, Singapore, Thailand, The Philippines and Vietnam -- in the Lao capital.

END TO POLITICIZATION OF SOUTH CHINA SEA ISSUE

Wang said the so-called award rendered recently by an ad hoc tribunal handling the South China Sea arbitration is tantamount to filling a wrong prescription for the South China Sea disputes.

The former Philippine government, headed by Benigno Aquino III, unilaterally initiated the South China Sea arbitration in 2013. The move has violated the Philippines' standing agreement with China to settle relevant disputes through bilateral negotiation, violated China's right to choose means of dispute settlement of its own will as a State Party to the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS), and abused the UNCLOS dispute settlement procedures.