By The Straits Times | Created at 2026-09-09 04:48:18 | Updated at 2026-09-09 05:45:54
1 hour ago
SEOUL – Philippine Defence Secretary Gilberto Teodoro Jr hit out at China at an international forum after a memo asserting Beijing’s position over their longstanding maritime dispute was delivered to him while he was speaking onstage.
The bizarre incident was captured on video at the Seoul Defence Dialogue on Sept 8 as the secretary was responding to a question about so-called grey-zone coercion in the South China Sea.
The video shows what appears to be a conference staffer placing it on the table next to him while speaking.
“I have a note here, I think this is from China,” he said, describing it as laying out Beijing’s position on the South China Sea.
He then reads it line-by-line and offers ad-lib responses to each point, before launching into an attack on what he said was China’s efforts to influence his remarks.
“This is not grey zone any more,” he said, using a term to describe coercive actions that don’t cross into armed conflict.
“This is actual coercion, bullying and aggression,” he said, speaking next to the South Korean and Czech defence ministers.
“Perhaps basic decency and behaviour is what China needs to do,” he said, drawing applause from the audience.
He added, speaking in Tagalog, “Have some shame.”
The Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.
South Korea’s Yonhap News said the memo was written by a military attache at the Chinese embassy in Seoul.
An event staffer mistook it for a note from the Philippine delegation and delivered to Teodoro while he was on stage, the report said.
Teodoro is a frequent and outspoken critic of China’s behaviour in the South China Sea, and the two countries’ coast guards have repeatedly clashed in disputed areas.
China has also imposed sanctions on Teodoro earlier in 2026, accusing him of making remarks that damaged bilateral ties and of raising tensions in a relationship already strained by territorial disputes.
Teodoro is the most senior Philippine official known to have been sanctioned by Beijing.
The memo said China neither accepts nor recognises a ruling under the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, known as Unclos, that acknowledges the Philippines’ claims over part of the disputed waters, according to Teodoro.
“I will keep this paper as a memento of how desperate China is and how ineffective its position is in the face of a free audience,” the secretary said.
“Thank you very much for the person who gave me this piece of paper,” he said. “You’ve just done your country a great service. Thank you. And I hope you don’t suffer in a gulag for it.”
China doesn’t have a gulag system, which is a reference to a Soviet Union-era forced-labour prison camp.
At the Shangri-La Dialogue in 2025 in Singapore, the Philippine defence chief criticised Beijing for what he called “propaganda spiels disguised as questions” during a testy back-and-forth with Chinese officials. BLOOMBERG
