BEIJING, China—Chinese President Xi Jinping has promised to "find a compromise solution" to allow Filipino fishermen to fish in their natural fishing grounds.
President Ferdinand "Bongbong" Marcos Jr. revealed this following his bilateral meeting with Xi during the former's three-day state visit in the China capital.
The President said Xi made the promise as they were discussing the two countries' political concerns.
"On the political front, we also discussed what we can do to move forward to avoid possible mistake, misunderstandings that could trigger a bigger problem than what we already have," Marcos said.
"nd I was very clear in trying to talk about the plight of our fishermen and the President promised that we would find a compromise and find a solution that will be beneficial so that our fishermen might be able to fish again in their natural fishing ground," Marcos added.
The chief executive said this was among the many subjects they covered during their second bilateral meeting, following their Thailand meet on the sidelines of the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation last year.
"We covered so many subjects much more than is usual for this very formal meeting," he said.
"In the end, we came fairly detailed discussions which made the meeting ran very long. That's why I'm actually very optimistic because President Xi seems to be genuinely interested in all of these issues and finding a way to move forward to again strengthen the relationship between China and the Philippines," he further said.
Marcos detailed that they talked about the trade imbalance between the two countries and what they can do to remedy this.
The two leaders talked about the trade imbalance between the two countries, the Durian protocol, renewable energy, people to people relationships, tourism, cultural exchanges, education exchanges, infrastructure development, and climate change.