National-democratic groups protested in front of the US embassy today, April 11, to denounce the “trilateral summit” of the Philippines, Japan and the US being held in the US. Ferdinand Marcos flew to the US yesterday to meet with Joseph Biden, the US president, and Fumio Kishida, the prime minister of Japan for a meeting at the White House. This meeting is held in within the US framework of expanding its presence in the first-island chain, which includes the Philippines and Japan, under the veil of “security” and “freedom in the South China Sea” to promote “maritime peace.” Bagong Alyansang Makabayan (Bayan) led the action.

“The Trilateral Summit between the [US], Philippines and Japan is Washington’s platform to further polarize the Asia Pacific region,” according to Bayan. “It does so by pushing existing tensions to a critical level whereby US-led imperialist economic and military warfare will devastate the lives of working people in the region and squander the people’s money…”

Movements for sovereignty, peace and national liberation from the Philippines, Japan and the United States condemn this latest imperialist drive to bolster profits from war and economic plunder, according to the group. “We do not bow down to US imperialism’s vicious reassertion of hegemony in Asia as it foments war with China.”

It denounced the US for inflaming existing conflicts involving Taiwan and the Philippines in relation to China as justification for expanding its presence in the region. It also opposed the recent rapid military build-up of Japan.

“The Marcos Jr. regime at the Trilateral Summit in Washington DC gambles the country to further disaster just because of the whim of its US imperialist master whose only aim is to completely impose its hegemony on the region,” Bayan said. They marched holding a banner that said: No to US war games and US war provocations! Do not drag the Philippines into US-made wars!

The League of Filipino Students says the purpose of the trilateral summit is clearly to strengthen US hegemony globally. “The US will only use the trilateral summit to further divide the world and militarize the Philippines which it is preparing as a theater for an inter-imperialist war with China,” it said.

For Katribu, the trilateral summit means the expansion of the US military base into their ancestral lands and territories. “This expansion is a threat to the cultural heritage and way of life (of the indigenous people) and will intensify environmental damage to their lands,” according to the group.

Agreeing with this is the group Kalikasan, which is participating in the protest against the US war machinery. It says the war games and its activities in the Philippines cause pollution that damages the environment. The US also has a long record of using and leaving toxic chemicals on land they use for their bases and operations. It also called the US a “hypocrite” for calling for peace while engaging in the genocidal war against Palestinians in Gaza.

The rallyists condemned Marcos’ voluntary subservience to the US, which puts the Filipino people at risk. In the protest, they symbolically tore the faces of Biden, Kishida and Marcos, as well as the US flag.

Last April 9, the rallyists also symbolically trampled on and tore the face of Xi Jinping in front of the Chinese Embassy, as a symbol of the people’s opposition to its encroachment in the West Philippine Sea and harassment of Filipino fisherfolk. They called for the withdrawal of all foreign troops from Philippine maritime territory.