Philippine lawmakers say US move on Venezuela complicates Manila’s rules-based stance

The Philippines’ long-standing alliance with the United States has come under fresh scrutiny after Washington’s move against Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, with critics in Manila warning the action had complicated the country’s claim to champion a rules-based international order. Opposition lawmakers and analysts said the US operation, which resulted in Maduro being captured and brought to the United States to face charges, had left the Philippines “compromised” and exposed to charges of double standards, as it invokes international law in disputes with China while Washington is accused of disregarding those same principles elsewhere. The tension is especially acute as Manila serves as this year’s chair of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean), a role that amplifies scrutiny of a country widely viewed as Washington’s closest security ally in the region. The Philippine government responded cautiously. In a brief statement issued on Monday, the Department of Foreign Affairs expressed “concern over evolving events in Venezuela”. While acknowledging America’s “security considerations”, the department said the Philippines “stresses the relevant principles of international law, including the independence and sovereign equality of states, prohibition against the threat or use of force, and non-interference in the domestic affairs of sovereign states”. Outside the US embassy in Manila on Monday, a small but vocal rally of demonstrators protested Washington’s military action in Venezuela, carrying signs denouncing the US intervention and calling for respect for national sovereignty. Activists were not the only ones to voice concern. One key lawmaker, House representative Leila de Lima, said the US operation had exposed an uncomfortable contradiction for Manila. “As a US ally, this leaves the Philippines with a compromised moral ascendancy in protesting, condemning, opposing and fighting China’s aggression,” said De Lima, a former justice secretary, in a statement on Sunday, citing the country’s efforts to challenge Beijing’s actions in contested waters. “This is due to the fact that our major ally against Chinese aggression uses that same aggression against a smaller neighbour, like what the Philippines is to China,” she said. “This reflects poorly on us as well, regardless of our own faithful adherence to international law, simply because the US is our ally.” The Philippines has been a treaty ally of the US since 1951, and in recent years has expanded defence cooperation with Washington – which American officials have described as an “ironclad” commitment under their Mutual Defence Treaty – granting US forces wider access to Philippine bases and openly embracing US support amid its territorial disputes with Beijing in the South China Sea. But that closeness, critics say, now comes with reputational costs. Another congressman, opposition lawmaker Antonio Tinio, told This Week in Asia that Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jnr had missed an opportunity to demonstrate consistency. Tinio said Marcos' failure “to strongly condemn the US for its blatant disregard of international law” had grossly undermined the government’s supposedly principled stand in its maritime disputes with China, which he said rested on the 2016 arbitral ruling under the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea that largely upheld Philippine legal rights over China’s claims. Tinio, who represents the ACT Teachers Partylist, questioned how his country could rally regional support while appearing selective in its defence of sovereignty. “How can the Philippines, which has assumed the chairmanship of Asean this year, expect to gain the support of neighbouring countries in the region against the expansionist claims of China, when it turns a blind eye to the blatant acts of aggression of the US, the Marcos administration’s closest ally?” he asked. Asked if what happened to Maduro could happen to Marcos, Tinio said: “Perhaps not a blatant abduction like that. However, the US will surely intervene covertly and overtly in the 2028 elections to ensure that Malacanang (the presidential palace) will continue to be subservient to its interest.” The comments echo long-running claims by the Marcos family that the ousting of Marcos Jnr’s father and namesake, the former Philippine leader Ferdinand Marcos, was aided by the United States, after he was flown out of the presidential palace in 1986 as the People Power uprising gathered pace. The family has long maintained that the elder Marcos had been “kidnapped” by American forces and flown against his will to Hawaii, a claim disputed by US officials and some historians. Tinio said the Venezuela operation fit a broader pattern in US foreign policy. “Historically, the US has acted as though it were a law unto itself, acting in its own interest, involving international law selectively, mainly as a weapon against its rivals,” he said. “What’s different with the US invasion of Venezuela is that [US President Donald Trump] openly and without pretence declares the colonial nature of the intervention – the US will ‘run Venezuela’, take its oil resources and hand them over to US corporations.” Roland Simbulan, a former University of the Philippines professor who has written several books on Philippine-US military relations, told This Week in Asia that “if any leader of the global south, including the Philippines, crosses paths against Trump, he will go to the extent of bombing the country and abducting its president on trumped-up charges”. He added that “we cannot count on treaties and rules-based alliances because the US only looks after its interests to invade countries with vast reserves of oil and rare earth”. De Lima echoed that assessment, calling the attack on Venezuela a “reality check” on “our reliance on the US for moral leadership”. Comparing the US under Trump to the actions of “China, Russia and Israel”, she said “the attack on Maduro undermines the rules-based international order, setting a terrible precedent of heightened aggression by superpowers”. In a separate statement released on Sunday, the Akbayan partylist, a progressive political group with a history of opposing authoritarian rule, acknowledged the “allegations of corruption, malgovernance, authoritarianism, economic hardship and human rights abuses under Maduro”. However, it said, “effecting change in Venezuela is ultimately a decision for the sovereign Venezuelan people to make, it is not for the US, or any external power to dictate”. “Rather than advancing democracy, this attack deepens regional instability,” the partylist said. The group warned that “Trump ushers in a new world order where geopolitical disputes are settled not through international law, but through brute force”. For Tinio, the most immediate danger lies in how closely Manila has tied itself to Washington. “The Marcos administration has been more than willing to accommodate the expanded presence of US bases, troops and advanced weapons systems on our soil,” he said, warning that this was “directly endangering our population and our critical infrastructure”. For sociologist Walden Bello, co-chair of the board of Bangkok-based Focus on the Global South, the Philippine foreign office’s cautious response reflected deeper anxieties in Manila. “I think the Philippine government is worried that the US is sending the message that you can do whatever you want in your backyard. Just don’t interfere with what we’re doing in our backyard,” Bello told This Week in Asia. He said the shift in US strategy meant the Philippines could no longer assume Washington would reliably back it in regional disputes. Simbulan warned that “might is right” had become the Trump doctrine, replacing the rule of international law and continuing what he described as the United States’ long history of “forever wars” marked by military intervention and aggression.

Philippine lawmakers say US move on Venezuela complicates Manila’s rules-based stance

.css-1c6uqr6{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;overflow-wrap:break-word;}Critics said the US operation has undercut Manila’s claim to principled diplomacy, given its close alliance with Washington

Critics said the US operation has undercut Manila’s claim to principled diplomacy, given its close alliance with Washington