MANILA: The United States and the Philippines announced a deal on Thursday to give US troops access to another four bases in the Southeast Asian nation, as the longtime allies seek to counter China's military rise.
The agreement to expand cooperation in "strategic areas of the country" was made during a visit by US Defence Secretary Lloyd Austin.
It comes as the countries seek to repair ties that were fractured in recent years. Previous Philippine president Rodrigo Duterte favoured China over his country's former colonial master, but the new administration of Ferdinand Marcos has been keen to reverse that.
Beijing's growing assertiveness on Taiwan and its building of bases in the disputed South China Sea have given fresh impetus to Washington and Manila to strengthen their partnership.
Given its proximity to Taiwan and its surrounding waters, cooperation from the Philippines would be key in the event of a conflict with China, which a four-star US Air Force general has warned could happen as early as 2025.
The four new locations bring the total number of sites accessible to US forces to nine, Austin told reporters on Thursday.
Talks were ongoing for a potential 10th site, a senior Philippine official said.
The announcement came as the United States reopened its embassy in the Solomon Islands after a 30-year hiatus as it competes with China for influence in the South Pacific.
The United States and the Philippines have a decades-old security alliance that includes a mutual defence treaty and the 2014 Enhanced Defense Cooperation Agreement, which allows US troops to rotate through five Philippine bases, including those near disputed waters.
It also allows the US military to store defence equipment and supplies on those bases.
The EDCA stalled under Duterte, but Marcos has sought to accelerate its implementation.
Philippine defence secretary Carlito Galvez told reporters the location of the new sites would be made public after local communities and officials had been consulted.
But it has been widely reported that most of the locations are on the main island of Luzon -- the closest Philippine landmass to Taiwan -- where the United States already has access to two bases. The fourth will reportedly be on the western island of Palawan, facing the Spratly Islands in the hotly contested South China Sea, taking the number of sites there to two. - AFP
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