As the Southeast Asian country faces growing Chinese pressure in the South China Sea, the Philippines has agreed to buy five coast guard patrol ships from Japan in a deal worth more than 23.8 billion pesos, and the ships will be delivered in 2027.
Japan will loan the Philippines 64.3 billion yen or around $413 million to buy the five 97-meter Multi-Role Response Vessels, and Japan will pay for the development of the required support facilities. This will support the PCG in improving its capabilities for maritime operations particularly in addressing transnational crimes and the aggressive China stint in the West Philippine Sea. These ships are the same size, as the biggest one currently in the Philippine Coast Guard fleet.
The Philippine Coast Guard currently has two 97-metre patrol vessels, as part of a fleet seen as insufficient for patrolling waters around the vast archipelago nation. In recent months, its vessels have been involved in several collisions with Chinese coast guard ships around disputed reefs in the South China Sea, which Beijing claims almost entirely.
The Philippine Navy said the world’s largest coast guard ship, which belongs to China, sailed deep into the country’s exclusive economic zone (EEZ) in the West Philippine Sea on Friday in what a US maritime security expert said was a move to normalize Chinese presence and jurisdiction in these waters.
Commodore Roy Vincent Trinidad, the Navy spokesperson for the West Philippine Sea, said the 165-meter China Coast Guard ship with bow number 5901, nicknamed The Monster, was seen 50 nautical miles off Scarborough Shoal, well within the country’s 200 nautical miles EEZ.
Without elaborating, he said the action would be taken most likely by the Philippine Coast Guard since it was a Chinese Coast Guard vessel that was involved. Over the past 24 hours, the world’s largest coast guard ship, the 165-meter China Coast Guard 5901, together with the 102-meter China Coast Guard 5203, conducted a brief intrusive patrol into the Philippines’ exclusive economic zone west of Scarborough Shoal.
Ray Powell, the head of Project Myoushu, directing to South China Sea at the MY, said in a post on X on Friday that the CCG’s monster ship was accompanied by a smaller China Coast Guard vessel.
In a chart accompanying his post, the two ships sailed from a northeastern direction, crossing the western boundary of the Philippines’ EEZ toward Panatag Shoal, and later made a U-turn before reaching it.
China, according to Powell, conducts intrusive patrols deep within the exclusive economic zones of neighboring countries to establish a continuous presence and gradually normalize Chinese jurisdiction over areas granted to its neighbors under international law.
The appearance of China’s largest coast guard ship, followed last week’s civilian-led convoy of four fishing boats that headed to Panatag, also known as Bajo de Masinloc, about 246 km west of Zambales, to deliver food supplies and fuel to Filipinos fishing in their traditional fishing ground and assert Philippine sovereign rights over its EEZ.
The convoy turned back about 93 kilometers away from Panatag after a fifth fishing boat had breached the 25 nautical miles to 35 nautical miles perimeter that the Chinese coast guard had set around the shoal as a no-entry zone for Filipino fishermen. Another CCG ship also appeared at the same distance (93 km) east of the shoal, the closest point to Panatag where the convoy decided to turn around.
The Monster’s appearance also comes ahead of the June 15 implementation of a new Chinese regulation that allows its coast guard to arrest foreigners and foreign vessels that cross its borders illegally and detain them without trial for up to 60 days.
Jay Batongbacal, head of the Institute of Maritime Affairs and the Law of the Sea of the U-P College of Law, said China’s new regulations were quite vague, and the arrest and detention of Filipinos within the country’s EEZ, would be illegal, and invalid.


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