ACTIVISTS from the group Bagong Alyansang Makabayan (BAYAN or New Patriotic Alliance) are opposing the planned reciprocal security agreement between the Philippines and Japan, accusing Tokyo of advancing Washington’s agenda in the Indo-Pacific region.
“We are being made to believe that all these military exercises are all meant to protect us from China, when the reality is that these are all meant to advance US hegemony in the region,” the group said in a statement on Thursday, ahead of Prime Minister Fumio Kishida’s official visit to the Philippines today.
Tokyo-based Kyodo News earlier said the two countries were expected to begin formal talks in November for a reciprocal military access agreement that is aimed at facilitating the presence of visiting forces.
BAYAN said the US has made Japan “a junior partner” and the Philippines a “vital cog” in its supposed “war machine” in the region. “The US has been involved in failure after failure in its interventionist actions, from Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, Ukraine and now Palestine. Why would we entrust our security to an interventionist power and its junior partner?” it said. — Kyle Aristophere T. Atienza
