Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte has moved against its long-time ally United States and is now seeking to have strong ties with China and Russia.
The president was known to be controversial after he reportedly cursed former United State's president Barack Obama in one of his speech. He has also traveled to nine countries already as president of the Philippines like Laos, Cambodia, Indonesia, Brunei, Japan, Malaysia, Vietnam and Singapore.
In a report, the 71-year-old president has openly admired Chinese President Xi Jinping and Russian President Vladimir Putin, who in turn reportedly signified their intention in meeting the Philippine president.
It was in October when Xi Jinping received Duterte in Beijing. There were more than $24 billion of investment pledges and help offered by China during this meeting and Duterte went home with those.
Despite the South China Sea dispute between the two countries, Duterte did not mentioned or even brought up about the July ruling tribunal about the disputed waters.
Moreover, in his visit in Beijing, Duterte made Philippines' separation from United States official.
"In this venue I announce my separation from the United States ... both in military and economics also," Duterte said, prompting his communications and economics teams to go into damage control mode.
Meanwhile, aside from China, the Philippines is already warming up with Russia starting off with exploring to military relationship.
