 Welcome to the latest event from the Long Distance Lowey Institute. I'm Ben Blan, the Director of the Institute's Southeast Asia Programme, and I want to start by acknowledging the traditional owners of the land on which I'm speaking, the Gadigal people of the Eora Nation. I pay my respect to their elders past and present. I'm delighted today to be speaking to His Excellency Teodoro Loxin, who was appointed as Philippine Foreign Secretary in 2018 by President Rodrigo Duterte. Secretary Loxin has had a long, distinguished and varied career. He's a lawyer by profession and a journalist by trade. He's also served as a senior official and an elected legislator. He previously worked as legal counsel and speechwriter to President Corazon Aquino and speechwriter to Presidents Josef Estrada and Gloria Macapagal Arroyo. Thank you, Secretary Loxin, for joining me today from Manila. Thank you so much for inviting me. First up, I want to ask you about your experience of diplomacy during the pandemic. I know that you've been able to travel a bit more this year to Indonesia, to China, to Washington, D.C. most recently. And of course, we have Zoom, which we're using today. But how would you say that COVID-19 has impacted on your ability to do your job as Foreign Minister of the Philippines? Well, the first thing it did was it changed my job from being Foreign Minister to Minister of Repatriations and Expatriations. When the pandemic broke out, the first thing that we attended to was that very many foreigners were stuck in the Philippines. And I have to give credit for its view. And I asked the foreign governments to help us and all of that. And later on, I found out, and you can correct this, that the foreign government, when its citizens are abroad, those citizens, and it's a very manly thing, have to take care of themselves. But the diplomatic corps here went out of their way. They didn't need to be told. In fact, they didn't care what the national governments wanted. They started rounding up all of their tourists. The Germans were in the lead, the Belgians, the Australians, the Canadians. And then they shared flights and they got them all out. Later on, they called up and thanked, their foreign ministers called up and thanked me. And I said, no, you also thanked the tourism secretary, Berna Puyat. She virtually dismantled her whole department. Her department is to bring in tourists. She dismantled it. Let's get them out. And we did. And that really astonished everyone. And I was so happy and so proud of the diplomatic corps. We got them. Then comes the second part. Repatriating Filipinos, we have 10 million Filipinos abroad. Well, effectively, I think we have about 4 million in the Middle East. And we got them home. I've gotten home, I think half a million already. And we were, we could have done it faster. But our capacity to quarantine them when they come in was a bit limited. Although I must say, I'm not trying to raise our chair. We did a pretty good job. We got everyone who wanted to go home, got home. As I said, I want them home. If they want to go home, I want them home. If they're dead, doesn't matter to me. Just bring them all home. So that's it. That's what we are. We're now, of course, some of my colleagues said to the boy, you brought them all home. Please don't lose their jobs abroad. I'm also going to push for that. I was also, I think this is magic. This is my job as foreign secretary. I opposed elements in my government to want the deployment back of nurses. And I said, why? And the official, well, even, you know, from the bureaucracy said, oh, just in case we get sick, we'd like to have them around. Really? I said, you want to have them around and you prepared to pay them while they stand around for you to get sick? No, then you should let them go because only now in Europe and all over the world, they are valued for what they are. The best caregivers ever. So little by little, I'm winning that fight and they're going to London, Germany, and going to places where they are wanted. And for God's sakes, they are at least decently paid for the risks they take and the work they do. That's been my job. And traveling around basically, China was easy. Although I can tell you, very, very strict. When I met with my good friend, Wang Yi once, and we were working on the code of conduct. We are China coordinator. I wanted to push it faster. And I said to him, I know that it's going very slow, even before the pandemic, but I'm telling you now, I'm offering our airline to bring everyone to Manila and finish this discussion. And he laughed. He said, why are you laughing? Because your flight engineer is positive for COVID. And they put a PPE on me and they even said, hey, that PPE is not for your protection. It's for our protection from you. And it's been like that. They're very, very strict. China has licked the pandemic, but boy, the cost is tremendous. According to Adam Tuzin, his book shut down and just close their eyes to the cost. I don't know how many countries can do that. We're doing it. We did the longest trip this lockdown. It's had a really terrible effect on employment. So I'm thinking of all your time. Please. I was just going to say, in terms of the sort of high level diplomacy, how has the kind of lack of face-to-face contact affected your ability to get things done when it comes to sensitive issues like the code of conduct on the South China Sea, talking about what's happening in Myanmar? How difficult is it to do those discussions on Zoom, on the phone, as opposed to face-to-face? Well, I was surprised. I'm not that... What do you call it? Becky? I'm just no good at that. Computer, someone always helps you with that. But for a while I thought it would be a hindrance, but it's not. It's actually saved us a lot of jet lag. Ministers won't admit to that, but they're half-dazed half the time. And we end up talking to each other on Zoom. The other thing is we don't grasp for ideas. When we go in front of the Zoom, we already know what you want to say. And from there, you can get an exchange, but none of this diggling around the issues. So that was good. But after a while, you also need, especially on the Myanmar issue, for example, why we met in Jakarta, because then it becomes a personal thing. It's among the leaders, one, and the other egos, which is the foreign ministers. But we could really talk Turkey among ourselves. The general was there, and we could tell him our experiences. I'm not allowed to reveal that and say, look, our position is I want the restoration of the status quo and the coup because that was working very well for everybody. But every power in the region, China liked it that way. And then suddenly this thing happens. I understand it was an internal dynamic. The general wanted an extension of his term, so he would have the same length as his predecessor. But because the election results came in, one interpretation is that the democratic forces felt overconfident and said, no, no extension. And then he said, okay, then everybody to jail. But then since then, it is all of us. No one's imposing on anyone. If we don't solve this in the right way, if we try to achieve a vacuous consensus, which is how we achieve consensus. It's a non-issue and then we all agree, fine. But this is a matter of the life and death of the credibility of us. Are we more than just people who agree over other dying things? And that's why we're in this situation now. I think we'll come back a bit to Myanmar and ASEAN later. I just wanted to stick with COVID for a bit now and vaccines because I know that your president at the UN was saying that it was shocking beyond belief that we see rich countries, including Australia, now talking about booster shots when many developing nations still haven't been able to do the first round of vaccinations. I think in the Philippines, you're now 30% of your target fully vaccinated and 65% with one dose. How difficult has it been for the Philippines to secure the vaccines you need and what have you been able to do to address this problem? My president is reacting, actually, to what is the comment on the Scottleback all over the world among leaders, that the rich countries, if you look at it from a certain perspective, are the ones who are hogging it and the poor countries don't have it. But in fact, we are getting it and we're getting it through the COVAX facility for which I praised the United States, for example, in sending their Pfizer vaccines to us through COVAX. In other words, it's not called vaccine diplomacy. I don't remember when we started, the first vaccines we got were naturally the first ones invented, which was Sinovac and Sinoform. When we started getting that, they were donations. And I said to my counterparts in China, I said, we'd like to buy it. And they said, we have 1.3 billion people here. We enter into contracts to sell. We lose control of when we want to give to you and when we need to administer it to our population. So, no, we're speaking to donations. Again, as you can see, that's not vaccine diplomacy. So that's worked very well. I talked to the British and they had AstraZeneca. That was great. They divided the world between the greatest pharmaceutical power in the world, India, to take everything from India to Africa, Thailand, everything below them, going the other direction covering us. And then something happened in India. And all those arrangements just evaporated. So we're doing what we can. And I remember the Americans, when we first, the new administration came in and they were a little apologetic about having ordered so much. I said, hey, I'm glad you overordered. Because if you did that, how would you be able to give us? We're not sure of our capacity to buy or order. So we hesitated. I accept that mistake. We hesitated. And now you guys have more than you need. Now you're sending it to us. Can you imagine if you hadn't overordered? The other thing I realized, talking to epidemiologists, apparently making these vaccines are not as easy and fast as we like to think. So the different factories have different qualities. So it's a big challenge. So those who overordered, I wouldn't blame them for anything. I'm glad they did. And now they're sharing it. So that's the good part. Yeah, there is vaccine hesitation. That's the thing that's a big problem. And in terms of the vaccines, obviously China, as you mentioned, has been probably the biggest single supplier to the Philippines. Outsideers tend to see this in terms of a battle for geopolitical influence. But do you think it's true that vaccine provision does give the supplier countries leverage in a place like the Philippines? We have never experienced that, I can tell you. Either you have it. We're very close relations with Russia. It has been that way since after the revolution that restored democracy. The thing is that what I know is it's availability that counts. And of course, I got to tell you this, our food and drug administration, they're very strict. And so what I was tendency to lose my temper and say, come on, let's go to the Russians immediately. And they'd say, no, there's no such thing as go to the Russians immediately. The way you do it is you go to specific factories and say, oh, Jesus, I would blow my top all the time. But I guess they know what they're doing. And that's what happened. And of course, just when we were about to clinch the Russian deal for Gamalaya, only Lancet peer-reviewed vaccine, the Germans turn to the Russians. Berkel says, give us your split link. Well, between the Philippines and the other side of the world and Germany next door, I guess Germany won. But the production is ramping up around the world. But you don't think it buys leverage for Russia or for the US or China? Having more vaccines, it's not something where you feel you're beholden to those countries on other issues because of the support or the supply they've given you. No, no, there's not even been a suggestion of that. I think there's a real fear for the great powers that if this continues, basically the world economy will implode. And then it's pretty much like climate change. It's where John Kerry and I completely agree, we've got to get China in. Because if this world goes to hell on the climate front, we won't even have a battlefield to fight over. So I think those two things, climate change now and the pandemic, it's an alliance for convenience and survival. Later, I'm sure the fights will continue. The issues will arise and the quarrels will intensify. I want to ask you a bit more about US-China competition because it is the defining struggle of our era and our region. The Biden administration seems to have brought into the Trump administration's talk of full-spectrum competition with China, but obviously executing with a bit more focus. Meanwhile, Xi Jinping and the Chinese government is really responding in kind. I think a couple of years ago, you yourself said that the Philippines can't do without American protection or Chinese progress. But how much more difficult do you think it is these days to enjoy both those things at the same time? I think the best thing that ever encapsulated was something I wasn't aware was Li Quan-Yu had said a long time ago, oh, I had a suspicion when I was in the U.N. The Asian society asked me to speak. And I said, and I don't believe I said, you know, I've been in the States a long time. I've gone to all that for the fact that the houses of the old aristocracy and how they love Chinese antiques and all of that, which comes from their history of sending their spinster aunts as missionaries to China. There's really a special affection there, which explains 12 bucks best-seller status in the 50s and 60s. And then I said, my fear is not that the two will fight. My fear, I told the Asian society, is that the two will be really, really chummy. And then that was when the Singaporean told me, that's a better way of saying it. Li Quan-Yu said, when elephants fight, there goes the grass. But when elephants make love, that's the end of the forest. And that's what we might be facing. It's not impossible that American wealth increased enormously with the trade and investments in China. China's re-creation of itself as a new China, they really owed American investments. It was a fantastic synergy. And then this came up. And there was, of course, a South China Sea issue, which was just us. When we fought for that arbitral award, we were alone. Nobody helped us. No one in Southeast Asia was on our side. No one in the West was on our side. But so when this thing came up, we weren't very sure whether the U.S. would be with us. And in fact, in the first incident, the one where we lost the reef, the U.S. was very ambiguous. He said, both sides stand down. And so we, our both did, the Chinese both did. And he said, now both sides withdraw. We are both dead. China did not. And that was it. So what happened? And they said, we don't know what happened. The best interpretation is to say, maybe they trusted China too much, or they really didn't care. I had a sense of this many, many years ago as the editor of my paper, when a SIGPAC commander, I mean, this was way before America and China was still great business partners. And he was retiring. And he just came up with this announcement. Then he said, the United States is absolutely indifferent to any territorial fights in the South China Sea. Jesus, nobody asked him. And why would you encourage that? But I must give this to Hillary Clinton, who was in the State Department at the time. And when I told this, and I get to be sure it's true, but I was told that Chinese diplomats asked her about that. And so what would happen if, you know, there was an increased presence in the South China Sea? And she had a very clever answer. She said, you're talking to the wrong person. You should talk to an admiral, because that's his remit. Take the message for what it is. You enter there, and you're talking to a guy with gun bullets. That's it. There's a way of putting your foot down without being offensive. And she had the quality. So despite the kind of the US talk of full spectrum competition with China, do you doubt the US resolve to kind of stay the course in this competition? You think it's more likely, in a way, they'll find a way to have a rapprochement with China? Well, I hope there's a rapprochement, because we need to get... I cannot imagine a world economic recovery without the engine of the Chinese economy. And the enormous, apparently, if you read Adam Tew's, the enormous capacity of America to keep generating wealth. That's the way to go. But if there was that hesitation, and there was, it was very common in the Philippines, this was fixed, may not be the most popular now, by Trump. Trump's diplomacy did it. Mike Pompeo's diplomacy did it. He just turned the whole situation around. Great. It worked out very well. And then now they've got them from a very vague language in the mutual defense treaty to very specifics. And he striked against a Philippine public vessel, triggers the mutual defense treaty. And so on. And I must tell you also, to be fair, in talking about these things with the Chinese side, they also don't like changes in the layout of power. They're used to the way it is, like the Soviets. And I checked this also with Americans. In the Soviet Union, you would talk to your others, to the other side, and say, if we do this, what will you do? And they would say, we do this. So you anticipate each other's most of no mistakes. Apparently the Americans and the Chinese military commanders do that. So that's good. And that's clarified the situation a lot. They are not happy. The Chinese are not happy by sudden changes in the layout of world power. Even some changes that seem favorable to them, they say, what you have done actually is introduce uncertainty in the equation. We all know when and how we're going to fight. Now you have introduced some variable. Say the VFA, when it was abrogated, and then I suspended the abrogation. And finally, the president restored it. And you know that this is really the mutual defense treaty. That's just how you take jurisdiction of an airing serviceman. But still, it sent the wrong signal. And it heightened tensions all over Southeast Asia. The Chinese were not crazy about that. You mentioned the visiting forces agreement there, the VFA, which was going to be terminated, and then not. And I think that marked a period of tension or instability in the US-Philippines relationship. But you've just been to DC. You've met Secretary Blinken for the first time. This is the 70th anniversary of the Mutual Defense Treaty and 75 years of US-Philippines relationship since the colonial relationship ended. Do you think there is now a new stability in ties between the US and the Philippines, a new understanding, if you like, between both countries? Well, if I may just say that what it did was not increase tensions between the Philippines and the US. What it did was increase tensions between China and the US. As some observers on both sides would say, OK, now the United States doesn't have the Philippines at its back. The Philippines doesn't have the US back. That doesn't mean the United States is pulling out. That means they're coming in, any big force. And their freedom of navigation operations, they're flybys, we're getting more and more medicines. So if there was any tension here, that sudden uncertainty we introduced increased it between the two great powers. And now it's back to the way it was, and everybody knows what they're going to do from the worst scenario to the best scenario, no more uncertainties. No surrender, no withdrawal, but no uncertainties. I mean, there's been some nervousness in Southeast Asia about how committed the Biden administration really is to engaging with the region, to engaging with ASEAN. I mean, what were the vibes of your meeting with Secretary Blinken? Do you think that the US will be kind of following through with what it's been saying about deepening its relationships in Southeast Asia and turning up more often for the key events and forums? No, I don't have that sense. That's an old feeling that we've had with the neutral defense treaty since way before when we took power in 86, we overthrew markers and we were there, and there was always this uncertainty. Will they really back us up? And in the cruelest terms, some nationalists, Filipino nationalists would say, you actually think the United States would respect the neutral defense treaty with the colored people, Filipinos. So I brought this up because my job and they're calling it Tina and others. And they said, what are you talking about? We don't care about their color. We signed a neutral defense treaty with you to contain the Soviet Union. You're on this part of the world and Berlin is the other one that we signed with. We're using your attack and we do not, as you say, respond. What do you think Berlin will do? They'll drop us. If they cannot defend the Filipinos, just because of something like their color, well, how do we know they won't drop us also in a confrontation with the Soviet Union just because of our history of enmity in World War II? So they said, please, it is a part, that's what they told me, why don't you study your Morgenthau a bit more and realize that great powers need prestige. That's a great part of their power actually influence. They must never be seen to break their word, whatever the cost will be. I was pretty happy with that. Nothing sentimental about their response, just saying it's how the calculus of power proceeds. So I believe that too. They will lose credibility everywhere. I know what's in your mind now. You're probably thinking, what about Kabul? Well, that's a more complicated situation. Well, I was actually going to ask, I was going to ask you about Australia actually, which is another US ally, also celebrating 75 years of diplomatic relations with the Philippines this year. But from a Manila perspective, where does Australia sit? Where does it fit into the Philippine strategic outlook for the region? From the very start, when I got into foreign affairs, both as ambassador and as secretary, I always felt that with regard to ASEAN, I want, that's my position anyway, it's open. I want Australia to be part of ASEAN. They may not find it convenient, but I say ASEAN, I said, is not an ethnic, cultural, or in any way Asian grouping. It is a geographical grouping for mutual defense and regional stability. What rounds out the circle of security is the anchor of Australia right underneath. I said this in the Asian society, and I said, there it is. It's just hanging there. And Kevin Rudd started to laugh. You're almost making it seem as if they're just, you know, pair of iron balls. He goes, but he enjoyed his own joke. But it's true. I really believe that that is what it is. It's a geographic grouping for mutual security, and they really fit. I must tell you also, when it came to, we were trying to get submarines or going to buy it from France, which comes with a 20 year warranty and training. But we were advised, one is once you get it from Brazil where they actually make it. And of course the French said, well, when you do that, you don't get the 20 year warranty. And then someone suggested in the American department. So why don't you get two extra from Australia because they seem to have ordered two more than they wanted, than they needed. And next thing you know, it's changed with Ocos and now it's going to be nuclear subs. And you know my position on that. That strengthens the balance. Because when one power is too far away, the other power may think that proximity gives them an advantage. But when the whole area of the future battlefield is just swarming with really deadly weaponry, that clears the mind, focuses thinking, and makes them realize that never overreach because the response will be immediate and possibly devastating. To also be this, if you did not have Ocos and the nuclear submarines swarming the area, both of both powers, all powers, if you didn't have that, there would be that lack because what Mir Shimer says, there's the stopping power of water. There'll be a delay in say the American response to a Chinese overreach. The problem with delay is that the other side will say, oh God, they've already established a fair, complete status quo. So the hit will be stronger. Just imagine if there was just an accident that happened to the South China Sea swarming with different vessels. I think they'd be able to solve it commander to commander. And you know, that's to me, that's just my reason why I stuck my neck out for Ocos when the rest of ASEAN held back. Why do you think your neighbors like Indonesia and Malaysia are much more concerned than the Philippines? Do you think that they're actually privately more supportive and they're scared of Beijing's reaction or you think those are kind of deep, genuinely held fears on their part? I think there is a reaction to increasing the swarming in the South China Sea by rival powers. One is you could also be inviting a conflict. But I'm an old man, I come from the Cold War and that's what I saw, the success of the parents. So I'm just coming from that direction. My colleagues in ASEAN are much younger than I am. So they see things another way. But we'll be talking to each other quite a lot about that. And Australia in some ways finds itself in a similar position to the Philippines with the US as a security guarantor and China as key economic partner. And also, unpleasantly for Australia has found itself on the end of Chinese economic coercion as the Philippines has in the past. Do you think Australia can learn? And I think from the Philippines' experience of trying to kind of live between China and the US and balance these forces out? No, it's the same with the Philippines. I can tell you that in all the time I have dealt with Beijing and the foreign minister they have never taken exception to our friendship and military alliance with the United States. For them, it's not incompatible. Economic cooperation, this is advantages and security concerns. That's fine. They just want predictability. They just want to know where everyone's cards are and where I come from and the theory of the balance, how you're going to move your pieces. I'm changing metaphors here. How you're going to move your pieces in what circumstances? Sorry to interrupt, but why do you think Beijing seems to have more of a problem with Australia's alliance with the US? I think it seems that there's a perception that that is something that they're uncomfortable with, whereas you say that they're okay with the Philippines alliance. So why do you think there's this differential treatment for Australia compared to some others? I can admit, I'm rather puzzled because there's a great economic opportunity on both sides. Minerals, domestic products, Australian wine, possibly the best, unless you talk to a Frenchman. But I don't understand that because we are actually our engagement with the United States is actually more deeply militarized than Australia. One is its geography. As I said, it rounds out the Southeast Asian region, but that also means it's in the extremity. They're not in the battlefield, in the future of the battlefield. That is a puzzle to me and for me, it's a wasted opportunity for Australia. You can continue to be geopolitical rivals, military hostile if you want to be, but I really don't understand why that's happening at all. At the same time, then you get news that American business with China is pretty robust from big American companies still going on, including with Apple. So I don't know how they got dragged into that. Perhaps you could help us understand. Well, I think, yeah, we're still trying to understand it here, but it seems that there's a perception that Australia is a weak link in the US alliance system and I suspect that's partly what the issue is. But I want to ask you a bit more about the South China Sea, which you mentioned. We know that the tensions there kind of ebb and flow with the seasons and with the typhoons, but in the medium term, it does seem that the pressure on the climate states, including the Philippines, is rising along with the risks of conflict. I mean, how dangerous would you say the situation is at the moment? I don't think it's dangerous. They understand every move they make that violates what we know are rights. Remember, they have claims, we have rights because we were at the port and we won't. So I don't see any potential for a sudden threat. But what happens is they try and then I find diplomatic protests, which apparently, you know, negates any suggestion that their occupation of that area for a short period of time can change in the ownership. So that's it. We keep doing it and we're doing very well. And do you think, obviously, ASEAN member states in negotiating a code of conduct with China on the South China Sea, it's been in talks for many, many years. They drag on and on and on. Do you think that in the end it will actually be, when it's finished, a useful tool for the balance of power, or is it more actually an implicit recognition of China's hegemony over the South China Sea? That's very good, sir. Because I understand, because I was noticing it and there was resistance from the Western powers. And I said, they just want to, the China COC is just meant to see how we can continue to use freedom of navigation. And in the event of a collision or anything like that, we have a mechanism for settling it. And then it struck me why the West didn't want it. The fact that you need a code of conduct in this area is already a recognition that the dominant power is China. That must have been it. That's my guess. But I think that's really where it's coming from. The fact that he said, but I'll tell you, it's going so slow. We're comfortable with it. We know we have the mutual defense treaty. We have our military arrangements with Australia. We're covered. But maybe if you are on the Asian mainland and the army is just 72 hours away, consisting of, say, 1 million men, maybe you wouldn't be as, you know, as sanguine as I am out here in the Archipelago. Again, Mirsheimer's stopping power of water. We're protected. Indonesia's protected. That's why Indonesia is more flexible. But those on the mainland are not so happy. And I want to talk more about China's style of diplomacy. I mean, you mentioned yourself, Secretary, that you're not averse to issuing strongly worded diplomatic protests. But recently we've seen China take a turn to a much more aggressive style of what people have called wolf warrior diplomacy. It seems to have backfired in the West. Public opinion has turned against China. But I wonder what your take on it is from a Philippines perspective. Do you think it's actually an effective approach for China to communicate its views and to get others to back down? Or do you think it risks turning countries against it? No, I don't think it really matters. One is if I tried to make a fuss about that, they would tell me, hey, look, coming from the mother wolf, they're going to ask us to behave. So, you know, forget it. And it's the same. I think as a newsman, OK, very speak a newsman, wolf diplomacy, wolf warrior, that's a movie, right? A Chinese movie about an African rescue mission. Anyway, the wolf warrior forces them to articulate very clearly that extreme position, which sometimes comes to is refreshing because the Americans are also known for wolf warriors. In fact, that's their style of doing laying down the law. So sometimes it's good because, you know, what's the extreme? If you, the language of traditional Asian diplomacy or European diplomacy is so soft, so filled with generalities, you really don't know where you are. Now, at least, you know, what's the red line for them? What's the red line? They know from us. What's the red line from us? I don't think wolf warrior diplomacy has been bad. And I think I should share this with you. OK, you had an example of wolf warrior diplomacy by both worlds in Anchorage, Alaska. Was that Anchorage? Yes, Anchorage. And I thought it must have been bearable, but I have it from within that after the cameras of the newsman left, they had a really fruitful discussion. Everyone had gotten all this at a musting of his chest and then they sat down to business. It was a long, long meeting after that. So, OK, that's good. It's the same. I did that to the Chinese when I first came in. I was interviewed by the Global Times, which is the military newspaper. And they were talking and I said, you know what? I told the publisher. I said, the road of Philippine-Chinese cooperation and mutual benefit is actually a highway. It's wide and full of opportunities. But there is a pebble in the middle of that highway. And you know what? With all that space, that's where we're going to stumble and that's where we're going to fight. It's happy. I thought you wouldn't print that interview, but it came out in the Global Times. So I guess it's clarifying. Well, as you say, you've been a communicator all your life, but you're also a bit... I think you've described yourself as the original wolf warrior, right, before. You're an active tweeter. You've got 700,000 followers that you tend to speak your mind. I think it's fair to say. But yeah, I was going to ask, what role does social media play in your diplomacy and are there risks to this kind of approach? I got to be honest with you about that. When I do Twitter, one is, I'm sorry when I resort to bad words, scotulous words, but that's my temper. And my daughter's always around to delete it. I can tell you that there are more... What you see there, that's just different. My daughter... And you know daughters, right? They just bully us. They just take it out. They just take it out. But what it does is it clarifies issues in my mind. And then I get a chance to reformulate them in an elegant way, if I can. But I am appealing to the public. Actually, everyone on my following on Twitter, I'm not a popular guy. It's just that we like to engage each other. Half of those guys on Twitter that follow me, they want to brain me. But I keep the conversation going. I never stop. And they listen to me. They argue with me. It's a great way of exchange. So it's not a weapon. It's just a way of clearing the air. Okay. I want to come back to ASEAN and Myanmar, which you mentioned at the start. We've got the key annual ASEAN summits coming up later this month. And I know your Malaysian counterpart has suggested that Min Ong Laing, the chief of the military junta in Myanmar, should not be allowed to attend the ASEAN summits because the military government has failed to cooperate with ASEAN's envoy. I mean, do you agree with that view that the head of the military should not be allowed to attend the ASEAN summit? Yes. It should be, did you mean the head, the junta head? Yeah, the head of the junta, Min Ong Laing. That's my position. I will be sitting down with my ASEAN colleagues about it, but I'm pretty definitive about this. First, I want to see really the return of the status quo. And when I ask for that, from the very start, that's my position. I even insulted the Europeans for denigrating Suu Kyi over the Rohingya issue and weakening her hand in the Myanmar political equation. But from the start, we all got along very well, all the powers with that semi-democratic government. Why did you have to do that? We can't move forward unless you go back to the way it was. And when I made that statement, I also said the army of Myanmar is essential to its existence because without that army, and if we listen to the Europeans, the usual crowd there that went after Suu Kyi, Myanmar would become what they made Libya, a hellhole of America. That's what's going to happen there. So the army must stay there. What's their problem? Once another six years, you can have it. So I have none of my business. But to destroy that, and to destroy basically a sentimental view of Suu Kyi, that only was she my writer in my newspaper. She writes very, very well. But she is historically the daughter of George Washington. Her father founded that nation. Her father founded that army. Just like Washington founded the continental army. You're going to take her out of the equation? Where's your personality? Where's your identity? So I don't think I can compromise on that. I follow Malaysia. And what more do you think ASEAN can do on Myanmar given those core principles of non-interference and respect for national sovereignty, realistically, how much further can ASEAN push? Well, we can continue with this, keeping them at a distance. But as I said, you know, if we do, if we relent in any way, our credibility as a real regional organization disappears. What's that? We're a bunch of guys who always agree with each other on the worthless things, the things that don't count in the world. Well, I don't know what that is, but it doesn't seem like a vibrant alliance or regional group. So, and I'll tell you, all my colleagues in ASEAN and the leaders themselves, they know that, they share that view. And even if sometimes you say some of those on the mainland may be softer, that's just, they're trying to keep an opening, don't make them feel that their backs are against the wall, but they all know what's at stake, the credibility of this association. Do you think ASEAN can push harder, like maybe even suspending Myanmar's membership? Do you think it needs that kind of tougher approach, a next level of almost sanctions, or was that too, a step too far? Well, what sanctions can we impose? But I can tell you one thing, I do believe, and my ambassador in Washington, we must continue to help the people of Myanmar and so on vaccines. While my ambassador there, of course, would have been happy if he could have argued for the Philippines to receive more vaccines from the United States. This argument was, don't forget Myanmar. And my argument over here was, and don't forget the small island states, a pandemic outbreak in small island states in the South Pacific, literally erases them. So no, no, but this I added when we were asked to make that commitment. I said, however, if the junta insist that the vaccination be carried out by the army, perhaps it's the only thriving organization there that can roll out vaccines. I don't want it to be, you get a job and you go to jail, because now we have you in our hands. Or you get inoculated and then you get incarcerated because you have just shown your face. But that's out of the question. Cannot be a weapon for civil control. I want to ask a bit more about domestic policy because obviously it often drives foreign policy. And as foreign secretary, you've had to deal with some very strong criticism of the Duterte administration's human rights record. The International Criminal Court has recently launched an investigation into the mass killings during the war on drugs. I think your government has said that it won't cooperate with that investigation. Why is that given everything the Philippines has said about the importance of international law in other issues like the South China Sea? Well, on that issue, by the way, I was the one who pulled this out of the ICC. I pulled this out when I was ambassador to the United Nations. That's because, again, as I said, I'm an old man from the Cold War and we were warned by the United States when the ICC came up. You do not subscribe to that because we have a military alliance. Our soldiers will be in your part of the world. Your soldiers will be training in ours. We cannot have an outs... Because the U.S. is leery of international organizations getting jurisdiction over them. If something should happen with one of our soldiers in your area, things can happen when people are armed. You know, of course, that you would have to surrender them to the ICC. And so you should not. And so from every administration it went on, the Senate was never given a chance to ratify... to accept the ICC treaty, except for one. And this is a very personal thing. We had a great senator. She might well have won the second presidential election after Cory Aquino in St. Ramos won. She was feisty, she was smart. And we felt... I asked her, why don't you run for the Senate? So you can, you know, cool your heels or make another run for the president. And she won. And then, but I know her... Everyone knew her heart was in international law and the senators really admired and loved her. And so when she was stricken with cancer, in an excess of emotion, they ratified the ICC and then nominated her to enter. In fact, she never made it. She died before she could do that. And that's what it is. As far as I'm concerned, I come from that part. You got... When the president took me as foreign secretary or for that matter, as UN representative, he knew my background. To begin with, his best friend then, Cito Ayala, one of the banana kings, they grew bananas in the canal and plantations. He was his patron. So he knew my personality. He knew where I was coming from. The role I played in maintaining U.S.-Philippine relations of Kori and everyone and everyone that followed. So when I took that position, that's after it. This is what we hired. This is what we got. Now, whether on this case now, it has to do not with... But with cases previous to the withdrawal, by withdrawal from the ICC. Well, it's being studied now by the Department of Justice, headed by the Secretary of Justice, Givara, who's arguably one of the most sober, smart jurists I've ever met. So he'll make the decision. How to engage this without it anyway, implying or suggesting that we are ever returning to the ICC. Not why we have military alliances to consider. I also want to ask about Maria Ressa, the Philippine journalist who founded Rappler. She won the Nobel Peace Prize recently for her work for, and I'm quoting here, exposing abuse of power, the use of violence, and the growing authoritarianism in her native country. I think it's the Philippines' first ever Nobel Prize, if I'm not mistaken. How do you feel about Maria winning that award? Well, I congratulated her when she won it. I said, well, you're really lucky. You have better friends than my president. All Mrs. Aquino did was restore democracy. All she did was prove to the world that peaceful people power, taught by Gandhi, never practiced by Gandhi, can work to change the political situation. She restored democracy without a shot fired. And you know what? The only one who has competed with her was a Costa Rican president. I can't even remember what the guy did, that he should have been mentioned. But there was something I thought in my tweet. I said, Maria, you really have good friends. They knew how to present your case to the Nobel community. I had a woman who changed the world. People power liberated Eastern Europe. It was the example they all followed and they took it. And she couldn't get the Nobel Peace Prize. I said, why are you lucky with your friends? Now, as for the question of press suppression, tyranny, et cetera, again, I'm old. We had the biggest newspaper in the country. It wasn't virtual. It wasn't something in the cloud. It was a whole plant. It was the best printing plant outside Japan because we built it. Because it was founded in 1908. It fought the Americans in the American occupation. It attacked every president. And finally, under Marcos, his personal friend, nonetheless, it was shut down. I was there when the army came in and I was on the phone. The colonel just slapped the phone out of my face. And then they swept in. I immediately ran into the printing plant and shut it down before they should. Thinking maybe a month later, we could open up again. But so when it comes to suppression of press freedom, I know it when I see it because I lived it. My father went to jail. But there are different standards now. I call that the age of bronze journalism. This is now the age of internet, I guess. I don't know what you do when you are shut down in the internet. I want to move on before we run out of time to a few questions from our audience. So the first one is from Zeni Edwards, who's from the Australian Council for Human Rights Education. And she asks what the Philippines is doing to mitigate the problems caused by climate change? Of the cap, I can tell you the Philippines had this fascination with the threat of climate change, I think well before anyone else. We passed the strongest anti-pollution laws, some of which come from a family that's also in hospitals and created danger. Our laws forbid the incineration of hospital waste. Even the Europeans are telling us, what are you doing? So there's no ways to burn that without endangering the planet. I said we'll think about it, but so far the law is iron, no pollution to the extent we can. We are however, as Gutierrez in UN likes to introduce me, and here is the representative of the third biggest plastics polluter in the planet. And what can I say? So we're trying to stop that too. And more of the youth are involved. Yes, we're doing what we can. Everything we can, because us, as President Duterte and anyone who knows anything, I didn't believe it at first, but the frequency and ferocity of typhoons hitting our part of the world, especially the Philippines, meets me to suspect that climate change is real and it's an imminent threat. So now we're already aware of it. Otherwise, you might find out somebody said, oh, that's dead. He's the one at the Security Council, where they were tackling the issue of climate change and rising ocean levels. Then I said, well, this is terrible. But however, I must tell you, I see one bright spot in climate change and rising ocean levels. And that is that one day, all those disputed features taken from us, will all be underwhelmed. The Chinese laugh. The Americans laugh. But that I was being flippant. But the truth is, yeah, it means a lot. And that's why I believe this COP26. I hope China and John Kerry and the others get together in this. There's so many other things you can quarrel and fight about. But not this. And apparently the Chinese are taking it seriously. So I'll be following that. I'll be going there as well. Talking about quarrelling, we had quite a few questions about Taiwan, where we've seen tensions rising in the last few months. If the U.S. were to be drawn into a conflict with China over Taiwan, what would the Philippines do given the mutual defense treaty you have with the United States? The mutual defense treaty protects what they call metropolitan territory and it will not be an attack on the Philippines territories or now expanded to public vessels in the Philippines east. We'll be an attack on the metropolitan territory. And so we go to work. Taiwan is not part of our territory. So, and I don't know if they have a mutual defense treaty with the United States, but it was the United States that actually, because of Nixon, made us recognize Red China. We never had a quarrel with Red China, but it was communist or Catholic in the 50s, 60s, but it was the United States that took the initiative and sent one China policy and we adopted it. And that's it. So now there's only one China. To the extent possible, we make no reference to Taiwan to respect that. I know the Americans themselves. I think the Americans, when they did that, made a special arrangement for Taiwan, but I don't know what it is and I don't want to know. That's important. Another question from John Jethro Manangan, who's from the Philippines Army. He asks what impact AUKUS will have on Philippine-Australia relations. You've said you support it, but do you think it can change the dynamics, I guess, of Philippines-Australia relations going forward? Not at all. I think it complements the great relationship we have with the Australian defense establishment. When the VFA was under question in the early part of the administration, I'll give this to my president. He's strong, he's impulsive and all of that, but he always stops after his impulsiveness and then he asks for advice. For him, if it's defense, the only ones he wants to hear are men in uniform. So he called what looked like a cabinet meeting all the chairs filled with people in uniform, except for myself, not a soldier. And then he asked the, what do you think of the VFA? And one grievance after another came out, saying, I said, why is it that Australians treat us so well when we train them? Why is it that our wives can find work, our children go to school, but when it is Fort Bragg, it's not the same. It's like they don't like us. First I thought that was, why would you bring that up? But you know, American officers told me, hey, that's, you're not a soldier. So you don't know how important it is for a soldier to feel when he is training with an ally that he is welcome, that his family is safe. He says, no, your officers are correct. We could do better. But then I've tried to explain that Australia is a big, big country and a very tolerant population. America is a big, big country with a lot of people and very deeply divided on racial, political and other grounds. So maybe we shouldn't hold them up to the great Australian standard. That really annoys people when I say that. But it is true. Our soldiers, our officers really love working with Australia on the fence. So this will, this is just, of course, even if I didn't think about the parents theory, I would have listened to our soldiers and say, yeah, they treat you well. So we stand by Australia the way they stand by you. I mean, also on that issue, Steve Kuntzler asks, what tangible steps can the Philippines and Australia take to protect free passage through the South China Sea? And I guess the follow-up would be, for example, would you encourage Australia to conduct freedom of navigation operations in the South China Sea as the US has done? Well, the freedom of navigation operations is there in the international law of the sea. But they can do it. And as you know, they've come in and their training, our Navy and Coast Guard are training with them. So that's obvious. If, okay, when the COC first came up and I was in the U.N., the first thing I threw out was a suggestion that the COC would somehow implicitly exclude Western powers. No way. I said no. The COC is out and will govern how our vessels and Chinese vessels, if they ever get into a disagreement or a collision or whatever, how that will be solved. But there's nothing to do with excluding any other power from the region. We're almost out of time, Secretary Loxin, but I've got one last question for you. Obviously, you've had a lot of experience in your career as a journalist, a lawyer, a legislator, diplomat, foreign secretary, president, I believe, or you've worked for four presidents. What do you think the legacy of the Duterte administration will be as it enters its last year? How do you think people will see President Rodrigo Duterte in kind of the history of the Philippines and what will be his contribution? It's worse. We can't even understand the past. It's hard to predict the future, but I can tell you this. From the words of an American senator who said the restoration of the DFA, the restoration of the old military alliance is better off now for what happened. The disagreements that Duterte had with the United States. Every president, since independence, has wanted to have an independent foreign policy. That's a fact. If Magsaysay does not seem like it, there's an old legend that, say, somebody has put him in power. That's not true. That's my bad friends who put him in power. But I can tell you every president, Kirino wanted it. Garcia wanted it. Macapagal wanted it. Every president wanted the first to actually do it to go on their own was Marcos. He was the guy who jailed by that, but I give him credit for that. He went to Russia and he went to China. He said, I don't want to be pushed around by Americans. That's why she was too late defending the bases. When they get time to renew the U.S. bases, she hesitated. But the Senate had already decided that they were going to go and abolish it. And then the volcano exploded, which made it move to an academic. Then she went out in the streets and tried to restore, I mean, what the president has wanted. And now this U.S. senator tells me, you know what you guys, what he did? Now we realize we should not take the Philippines for granted. And it would be a healthier relationship from Europe. All the things that our soldiers complain about, all of those things should be taken into consideration. So in the end, back to me, Duterte has finally given us. And in some respects, the emotional side that people don't like. When the Barangiga bells came and they were put back in the old church from which they were taken by the U.S. cavalry. My friend ambassador to the United States was with him. And he said, he asked everyone to get off except him. And he just ran his hands over the names of those who had been killed by American soldiers. And he started to cry. It's a thing they have. If you want to give a little more history, you know where the strain of resampling comes from? My own experience. My father loved the Americans because of the liberation of the Philippines, right? And then a book came out. It was called Little Brown Brother. The author was beautifully written. Leon Wolf. He wrote in Flanders Fields. It was the first time we ever read that it was a massacre again during the Filipino-American war. And for some reason, these old people they never forget what they read. And that changed the narrative. One book, one man. And he was an American. And now that's all out. Duterte has brought out everything in the past that he has resented. And yet we go forward with the United States. And as the American senator said, you're going to change. On that positive note, thank you so much, Secretary Loxin, for sharing your time and your views with us today. It's been a fascinating discussion. Thank you to everyone who's been watching. And I do hope you'll all join us again soon for another Lowy Institute event. And in the meantime, please stay safe and stay well.