MANILA, Philippines (AP) — The Philippine defense chief on Monday called China’s expansive claims in the South China Sea as “the biggest fiction and lie” that no Southeast Asian country would accept and said that Chinese President Xi Jinping’s aggressive policies have undermined the international goodwill fostered by his predecessors.
Defense Secretary Gilberto Teodoro fired off his latest tirade against China’s increasingly assertive actions in the region on the same day that the Philippine coast guard separately reported new incidents involving Chinese forces in the Scarborough Shoal, a hotly disputed fishing atoll in the…