The Philippine defense chief condemned China’s deployment of a swarm of armed coast guard forces, backed by a helicopter and a drone, closer to the Philippines’ military outpost in a fiercely disputed atoll in the South China Sea.

The latest flare-up in the long-seething territorial disputes around the Second Thomas Shoal came up in closed-door talks between Philippine Defense Secretary Gilberto Teodoro and his visiting Australian counterpart,

Xu likened the US to a "bully", saying that it had long benefitted from free trade but was now using tariffs as a "bargaining chip" to demand "exorbitant prices" from other nations. "US has imposed tariffs of up to 50% on India and even threatened for more.

China’s envoy to India has said Beijing “firmly stands with India” and denounced the US as a “bully” for imposing a 50 per cent tariff on New Delhi, in the latest sign of warning ties between the long hostile Asian giants.