President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. has not signaled any intent to declare China’s ambassador persona non grata, the Palace said on Monday, October 19, though the Chinese diplomat today has been officially summoned by the Department of Foreign Affairs.
‘We know the president’s view. He would not want this kind of declaration, against any representative of another country here in our country,’ Palace Press Officer Claire Castro told reporters in Filipino at a briefing. She was asked about calls from senators and congressmen to expel Ambassador Jing Quan.
On the same day, Foreign Affairs Secretary Theresa Lazaro formally summoned Jing and told him his October 15 remarks, said at a chance interview, were ‘provocative and unacceptable,’ the DFA said in a statement.
The department also rebuked the Chinese embassy for its public attacks on lawmakers. It was ‘not the place of a foreign mission to publicly criticize or taunt Philippine officials and legislators who are acting within their mandates,’ the DFA said. It reserved the right to take further diplomatic action, but did not say what that could involve or how Jing responded.
Castro said the Palace respected the views of lawmakers seeking Jing’s expulsion, but that Marcos would not go down this road as of yet.
‘Everything he says can affect our country and our people,’ she said.
The DFA has previously described declaring a diplomat persona non grata as an ‘option of last resort’ that carries heavy diplomatic consequences.