MANILA -- Following bilateral talks with Chinese President Xi Jinping the previous day, Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte said on Nov. 12 that a territorial dispute in the South China Sea between China and five Asian countries, including the Philippines, was "better left untouched."
"Today, China is the No. 1 economic power and we have to be friends," Duterte told a business gathering in Manila. He had just flown back from the Vietnamese city of Danang where heads of state, including Xi, had gathered for an Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit.
