US, Japan, Philippines to focus on economic partnership during trilateral summit — DFA

MANILA, Philippines — An official from the Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) said that the trilateral meeting between the Philippines, United States and Japan will only be focused on economic relations and will not be directed against any country. 

This has been revealed by DFA Undersecretary Hans Mohaimin Siriban in a Palace briefing on Friday, a week before the trilateral summit of the three countries. He shared that the leading agenda of the meeting will be promoting peace in the Indo-Pacific region. 

"It is really a deepening of the existing strong bilateral alliances that we have had and, of course, if you look at the areas of discussion that are being looked at, the primary focus, really, is on economic cooperation…building on economic resilience," the DFA official said.

“For the Philippines, our interest is to build economic resilience,” he added. 

However, he said that the three leaders, President Ferdinand Marcos Jr., U.S. President Joe Biden and Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida could also discuss the tensions in the West Philippine Sea, aiming to promote the freedom of navigation and the protection of Filipino fishermen.

"I think that is the hope of everyone whether or not this trilateral summit takes place or even in a bilateral context. That is our hope na magkaroon ng malayang paglalayag sa West Philippine Sea at sa ating mga karagatan,” Siriban said.

(I think that is the hope of everyone, whether this trilateral summit takes place or even in a bilateral context. Our hope is to have freedom of navigation in the West Philippine Sea and our seas.)

In an interview with ANC, the Philippine Ambassador to the U.S., Jose Manuel Romualdez, said that the trilateral summit will address China’s maritime aggression.

“We had made it clear that we will not give up in our territories but we continue to reach out and continue to sit down and talk seriously on how to resolve some of the issues involving territorial claims,” Romualdez said. 

The three leaders are also expected to issue a statement about the summit, according to the DFA official. 

Earlier, White House announced that Biden would host the first trilateral summit between the US, Japan, and the Philippines, to reaffirm their "ironclad alliance" on April 11.

The trilateral meeting is scheduled amid tensions in the West Philippine Sea between the Philippines and China, following a recent incident involving a water cannon resulted in three injured Navy personnel.