Will the Philippines now walk the talk?

"Let those who tied the bell on the tiger be the ones to untie it," goes a Chinese proverb, which means trouble is best solved by those who create it. Whatever the Philippine government was thinking when it decided to put its disputes with China in the South China Sea before a kangaroo court, it was surely not that the process would bring peace and harmony to a tranquil tropical sea.

China has been reiterating it will not accept the arbitral tribunal's opinion and would stick to the principle of settling disputes through direct negotiation. That policy is rock solid.

As neighbors facing each other across the sea, China and the Philippines have been friends for generations. There were no territorial disputes between them until the 1970s, when the Philippines suddenly decided that some of China's islands and reefs were up for grabs and occupied them without so much as a "by your leave". China's reaction to this affront has been restrained, to say the least, as it is not too difficult to conclude that China is the encroached-upon party rather than the encroacher.