MANILA—President Ferdinand Marcos Jr on Monday (Manila time) emphasized Asia-Pacific countries must avoid choosing sides in intense geopolitical rivalries amid high tensions being experienced in the region.

During a luncheon hosted for him and Philippine chief executive officers (CEOs) by the economic team in Davos, Switzerland, Marcos said nations in the Asia-Pacific are being pressured to take sides, without naming a country involved.

He noted members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) and the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) are committed they will not let return to the "Cold War mentality", wherein countries chose either to be under the former Soviet Union or the United States' influences in the 1980s.

"I think we are determined as a group in ASEAN and in the Indo-Pacific, those around the Indo-Pacific, despite all of this conflict we are determined to stay away from that,” a statement from the Presidential Communications Office cited Marcos as saying.

“And simply because we are anchored in the idea that the future of the Indo-Pacific, the future of Asia-Pacific for example cannot be determined by anyone but the countries of the Asia-Pacific and that removes us immediately from that idea that you must choose, we choose our friends, we choose our neighbors, that’s the choice that we will make," the President pointed out.

He added that the Philippines is in a "very precarious position as it is on the frontline".

He also took note of some countries' move toward nationalism and protectionism due to crises, including the coronavirus pandemic and the Russia-Ukraine war, that have battered economies around the world.

The Philippines can not depend on importation any longer for its economy to survive, Marcos said.

“We have to strengthen our own local economy to be able to withstand shocks such as the pandemic, such as Ukraine in the future and there is an element, there is a tendency of protectionism in that because we take care first of our own businesses, we take care first of our own industries, we take care first of our own economy,” he said.

Tensions continue to grow between China and the US and its allies in the Asia-Pacific, largely due to disputes regarding the South China Sea, one of the world’s source-rich waterways, and the freedom of Taiwan.

China claims most of the waters, while Taiwan, Brunei, Malaysia, the Philippines and Vietnam have overlapping claims. The United States considers it critical to its Indo-Pacific strategy and has been conducting “freedom of navigation” and naval exercises in the disputed water with Japan and the UK.

China also claims Taiwan, a self-governing democracy with strong links to Japan.

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Last August, Beijing carried out major exercises after a defiant visit to Taipei by Nancy Pelosi, then speaker of the US House of Representatives. The United States and Japan condemned China's "dangerous and provocative" military activities and called for "peace and stability" in the Taiwan Strait.—With a report from Agence France-Presse