“Trump would be an added problem rather than solution,” Pamalakaya said in a statement.
Speaking in Vietnam on Sunday before heading to the Philippines to attend the 30th Association of Southeast Asian Nation (ASEAN) Summit, Trump said he was prepared to mediate in South China Sea territorial dispute.
Pamalakaya noted that China “has been imposing its irrational claim over almost 90 percent of the South China Sea including the exclusive economic zone of the Philippines.”
“Letting US, a known China’s rival to intervene in the sea dispute will only aggravate the tension. The US has been challenging and provoking China by conducting air and sea patrol in the disputed waters. There could be no sincere mediation from a war-monger,” Pamalakaya said.
The group said “the US doesn’t actually want to settle the territorial dispute peacefully, rather, they want to exploit the conflict and advance its hegemonic agenda to control the natural reserves in the South China Sea,”
“We urge President Rodrigo Duterte to reject his American counterpart’s off er and pursue a diplomatic and peaceful resolution on the sea row with Beijing,” Pamalakaya chair Fernando Hicap said in the statement.
The fisherfolk group is among the multisectoral protesters against the ASEAN and visit of Trump in Manila.
