By Kyle Aristophere T. Atienza, Reporter

PHILIPPINE President Ferdinand R. Marcos, Jr. told the Australian parliament on Thursday he would not allow any foreign power to take “one square inch” of the country’s territory, and that Manila was firm in defending its sovereignty.

“I will not allow any attempt by any foreign power to take even one square inch of our sovereign territory,” he said in a speech.

Australia and the Philippines started their first joint sea and air patrols in the South China Sea in November, aimed at countering an increasingly assertive China, which claims the entire sea as its own.

The South China Sea is a conduit for more than $3 trillion (P168.5 trillion) worth of ship-borne commerce each year and is a major source of tension between the Philippines and China.

The Philippines accuses China of committing aggressive acts inside its exclusive economic zone (EEZ). A United Nations-backed arbitration court based in the Hague in 2016 ruled that China’s claims inside the Philippines’ EEZ had no legal basis — a decision Beijing has rejected.

China has chided the Philippines for encroaching on what it says is its territory.

Protecting the area is important to global stability, Mr. Marcos said.

“The protection of the South China Sea as a vital, critical global artery is crucial to the preservation of regional peace and, I dare say, of global peace,” he said. “We have an abiding interest in keeping our seas free and open, and in ensuring unimpeded passage and freedom of navigation.”

Mr. Marcos said the Philippines is now on the frontline of a battle to keep stability in the Indo-Pacific region.

He issued the remarks as the Philippines and Australia signed deals to boost their ties in the maritime domain and critical technology.

“As in 1942, the Philippines now finds itself on the frontline against actions that undermine regional peace, erode regional stability and threaten regional success,” according to a copy of his speech provided by the presidential palace.

“Then as now, the security and continued prosperity of the region — of countries like Australia — relies upon that effort,” he added.

One of the deals signed by the two countries seek to enhance information-sharing and interoperability between their maritime agencies, Mr. Marcos said in a press briefing with Australian Prime Minister Anthony Norman Albanese. 

The second deal seeks to promote the open and secure use of cyberspace between the two countries, while the third calls for cooperation between their national competition commissions.

Under the deal, the two countries would share practices and pursue capacity-building “on matters involving merger regulations, competition laws and investigative techniques relevant to implementing competition laws,” the palace said in a statement.

Raymond M. Powell, a fellow at Stanford University’s Gordian Knot Center for National Security Innovation, said Philippine efforts to expose Chinese bullying in the South China Sea has been “yielding tangible gains.”

“President Marcos’ approach to the West Philippine Sea requires strong international support,” he said in an X message. “He has been pushing for expanded joint patrols involving not just the US but also other regional military powers like Japan and Australia.”

Jeffrey Ordaniel, director for maritime security at Pacific Forum and an associate professor of international security studies at the Tokyo International University, said deepening Philippine-Australia ties could lead to a four-way security deal involving the US and Japan. 

“Closer Australia-Japan, Philippine-Japan and Philippine-Australia relations are prerequisites to forming a more formal quadrilateral coordination on common security concerns, in particular challenges in the South China Sea and over China’s potential invasion of Taiwan,” he told BusinessWorld in an X message.

“Japan and Australia are already important security assistance providers of the Philippines, complementing US efforts in enabling Manila to play bigger security roles,” he added.

Australia should push its defense companies to help the Philippines find its niche in the global arms trade, Joshua Bernard B. Espeña, vice president at Manila-based International Development and Security Cooperation, said in a Facebook Messenger chat.

Don Mclain Gill, who teaches international relations at De La Salle University, said Philippine-Australian partnership has grown tenfold given their shared goal of keeping the Indo-Pacific free.

Mr. Marcos was in Australia on an official visit, before he attends a special summit of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) in Melbourne next week. — with Reuters

By Kyle Aristophere T. Atienza, Reporter

AUSTRALIAN senators on Thursday hit President Ferdinand R. Marcos, Jr. for continued human rights violations in the Philippines.

Greens Party Senator Janet Rice, who was present during Mr. Marcos’ speech before the Australian Parliament in Canberra, pulled out a placard that read: “Stop the human rights abuses.”

Ms. Rice, who was escorted out of the building, said it was a shame that the government of Mr. Albanese, a Labor politician, invited the Philippine leader despite human rights violations and persistent corruption in the Philippines.

“Under President Marcos, corruption in the Philippines is getting worse,” she said in an X post. “There are hundreds of political prisoners, and anti-terrorism laws are used as legal cover for extrajudicial killings.”

The Presidential Communications Office did not immediately reply to a Viber message seeking comment.

Ms. Rice said it’s shocking that Labor and Liberal senators “would rather censure me than call out President Marcos’ lethal regime.” “They must do better to represent Australia’s values.”

The Australian Greens Party is the “most powerful third force” in Australian politics, holding 11 of 76 seats in the Senate.

Other Green senators including Jordon Steele-John, David Shoebridge and Barbara Pocock boycotted Mr. Marcos by holding protests outside.

“The Parliament is once more being used to launder the political reputation of those involved in serious human rights abuses,” Mr. Shoebridge said in a post on X. “This time it is Bongbong Marcos, president of the Philippines.”

“The deep, cruel legacy of the Marcos regimes — senior and junior — have crushed community, peasant, women’s, trade union and human rights activists in the Philippines,” he said. “We marked this legacy today as he visited Parliament.”

Mr. Marcos took office in 2022, more than 30 years after his late dictator-father was ousted by a popular street uprising in February 1986.

Human Rights Watch said rights violations in the Philippines remain rampant even as the country is now out of the hands of Rodrigo R. Duterte, whose war on drugs killed thousands.

“Drug-related killings implicating the police have continued under Marcos, if at a lower rate,” according to the group, adding that the Marcos government refuses to cooperate with the International Criminal Court’s investigation of the war on drugs.”

“Arbitrary arrests, enforced disappearances and extrajudicial killings of activists and human rights defenders persist,” it said, adding that the Philippine state continues the practice of branding activists and politicians as communists.

Emy Gasendo, a Filipino-Australian academic at the Australian National University, said Filipinos traveled from as far away as Brisbane, Melbourne and Sydney to join the protest outside the Parliament in Canberra. 

“Some drove as early as midnight,” he said in an e-mail.

Rommel Yamzon, secretary-general of Philippine-based rights group I-Defend, said the government has yet to deliver its promise to the United Nations (UN) Joint Program, which was started by the UN Human Rights Council to address human rights abuses.

“Concrete resolutions aimed at strengthening domestic investigative and accountability mechanisms, improving data gathering on alleged police violations and their impacts on addressing systemic issues of impunity remain deficient,” he said via Messenger chat.

Human rights group Karapatan called on the Australian people “to continue to support calls for justice and to hold Marcos accountable for the dire human rights situation in the Philippines.”

“The continuing human rights and international humanitarian law violations under Marcos, the prevalent climate of impunity and the Marcos family’s history of plunder and rights violations during Marcos Sr.’s dictatorship are more than enough reasons why the Australian people should denounce this regime,” Karapatan Secretary-General Cristina Palabay said via Messenger chat.

Mr. Albanese assumed his post as prime minister in 2022, ending nine years of conservative rule. He had committed to human rights reforms during the campaign.

Human Rights Watch said Australia should be concerned over the “rising harassment and violence against labor leaders and union organizers in the Philippines.”

The University of the Philippines Third World Studies Center’s Dahas project earlier noted that a year into Bongbong’s term, 342 people were killed by state agents in connection with illegal drugs.

Earlier this month, Dahas said at least 28 people were killed in the anti-narcotics campaign in January.

“Albanese should urge Marcos to act to stop these abuses and thoroughly investigate recent killings,” Human Rights Watch said.