A Chinese note was handed to Philippine Defense Secretary Gilberto Teodoro Jr. in the middle of his speech at the Seoul Defense Dialogue, prompting him to read the message aloud and accuse Beijing of “coercion, bullying and aggression.”
The incident took place in Seoul, South Korea, as Teodoro was speaking about the South China Sea and the Philippines’ disputes with China. A man in a white coat approached him during the session and placed a sheet of paper on the table.
“I have a note here, I think this is from China,” Teodoro said before asking the audience whether he should read it.
He did.
The message China wanted Teodoro to hear
The note restated Beijing’s position on the 2016 South China Sea arbitration ruling, which China has consistently rejected.
It said China’s position was “clear, consistent and firm” and argued that the arbitration violated fundamental principles of international law. The message described the award in favour of the Philippines as “illegal, null and void” and said China neither accepted nor recognised it.
Teodoro responded immediately.
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When the note challenged the arbitration ruling, he questioned how China could claim that the ruling violated international law when the proceedings were conducted under the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, or UNCLOS.
He then delivered a blunt response to China’s refusal to accept the award.
“Of course, because you lost,” Teodoro said.
Read about: United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea
The Philippine defense chief then turned his attention to how the note had been delivered.
“How can you deal with a country in an international forum… disrespecting the organisers of this forum, how do you expect to deal with it civilly?” he asked.
Teodoro described the episode as “actual coercion, bullying and aggression.”
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Why the 2016 ruling is at the centre of the dispute
The Chinese note was built around an argument Beijing has maintained for years.
In 2016, an arbitration tribunal constituted under UNCLOS ruled in a case brought by the Philippines that there was no legal basis for China’s claim to historic rights to resources within the relevant areas of the South China Sea beyond the maritime entitlements allowed by UNCLOS.
The tribunal also found that China had violated Philippine sovereign rights in certain areas.
China rejected the ruling and has continued to say that the arbitration process was illegitimate.
UNCLOS, however, provides that decisions issued by a properly constituted court or tribunal under its dispute-settlement provisions are final and must be complied with by the parties.
That legal disagreement remains at the heart of the confrontation between Manila and Beijing.
A private message becomes a public confrontation
The unusual part of the Seoul incident was not simply that China repeated its position. Beijing’s rejection of the 2016 ruling is already well established.
It was how the message reached Teodoro.
The note was delivered while he was speaking at an international security forum in Seoul. Instead of quietly putting it away, Teodoro made its contents part of his speech and challenged the Chinese position before the audience.
He later said he would keep the paper as a “memento of how desperate China is and how ineffective its position is in the face of a free audience.”
The Philippines and China remain locked in a wider dispute over competing claims and activities in the South China Sea. Manila continues to rely on the 2016 arbitration award, while Beijing refuses to recognise it.
In Seoul, however, the familiar legal dispute took an unusually direct form: China sent its position to the Philippine defense chief mid-speech, and he chose to read the warning to the room.
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