VOL. XXX NO. 157 3 Sections 32 Pages P18 TUESDAY : JULY 19, 2016 www.thestandard.com.ph editorial@thestandard.com.ph
Private companies tapped for beauty tilt
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CHINA SEALS AREA FOR WAR GAMES
BEIJING will close off access to part of the South China Sea for military drills, Chinese officials said Monday, after an international tribunal ruled against its sweeping claims in the waters. An area off the east coast of China’s island province of Hainan will host military exercises from Tuesday to Thursday, China’s maritime administration said on its website, adding that entrance
was “prohibited.” The area of sea identified is some distance from the Paracel islands and even further from the Spratlys, with both chains claimed by Beijing and several other neigh-
boring states. The Permanent Court of Arbitration in The Hague last week ruled that there was no legal basis for Beijing’s claims to much of the sea, embodied in a “nine-dash line” that dates from 1940s maps and stretches close to other countries’ coasts. Manila—which lodged the suit against Beijing—welcomed the decision, as China dismissed it as
a “piece of waste paper.” Despite Chinese objections, the European Union weighed in on the subject at a regional summit this weekend, with President Donald Tusk telling reporters that the grouping “will continue to speak out in support of upholding international law,” adding that it had “full confidence” in the PCA and its decisions. China pressured countries in
the Asean bloc of Southeast Asian nations not to issue a joint statement on the ruling, diplomats said. Beijing held military drills in the South China Sea just days before the international arbitration court ruling, state media reported. China has rapidly built reefs in the waters into artificial islands capable of military use. Next page
Courtesy call. Miss Universe 2016 Pia Wurtzbach takes a selfie with President Rodrigo R. Duterte after a courtesy call at Malacañang Palace on Monday. MALACAÑANG PHOTO
Duterte to confront China on drugs
Tax privileges for errant businessmen to be cut
By John Paolo Bencito and Sandy Araneta
PRESIDENT Rodrigo Duterte vowed to remove tax exemptions for businessmen who used their connections to build a fortune at the expense of the government and the environment.
PRESIDENT Rodrigo Duterte said Sunday night that he would confront China about the involvement of Chinese officials in the illegal drug trade once “bigger issues” such as the country’s territorial dispute over the South China
“These elitists living off the fat of the land, they’re doing nothing but transacting online,” Duterte said in Filipino during a gathering of his San Beda College of Law classmates at the Palace Sunday night. Next page
Sea are settled. Duterte’s statement came as a recent Social Weather Stations survey showed that a majority of Filipinos distrusted China. “When I come face to face with them, I will tell them all that is bothering me,” Duterte said in Filipino at a gathering of his San Beda College of Law classmates in
Malacañang. Duterte recently accused five police generals of protecting three big-time Chinese-Filipino drug lords. At the Palace, he also noted that four Hong Kong nationals were arrested when police raided “floating shabu laboratories” in waters off Subic. Next page