S'pore MFA rejects foreign embassies' attempts to incite domestic reactions to global issues

Singapore's Ministry of Foreign Affairs issued a statement rejecting "attempts by foreign embassies to invite domestic reactions to international issues involving third countries" on May 21.

This came after a day after the United States embassy shared on its social media channels, critiquing China's stance on the South China Sea using Singapore's HDB corridors to illustrate its point, and the subsequent response from China's embassy in Singapore.

The video

The U.S. embassy in Singapore, currently led by its Charge d'affaires, Casey Mace, posted a minute-and-a-half video on May 20.

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The video starts with drone footage of several HDB estates and with a seemingly Singaporean-accented voiceover.

The video makes the point that people's homes are their sanctuaries and that it is important to respect common space, showing pictures of cluttered HDB corridors, culled from online media, where inconsiderate neighbours had used common space to store their belongings, and in some cases, even blocking the entrances of other homes.

The video asks the viewers to imagine a neighbour who unreasonably felt they owned the common space in front of the viewer's home.

Fair and safe

It then compared the situation directly to China's actions in the South China Sea, saying that such a scenario happened "right outside Singapore's doorstep too, where one neighbour thinks he owns everything".

It should be noted that the area of dispute in the South China Sea that the video refers to does not directly abut any of Singapore's territorial waters.

The video continues to lean on the neighbour metaphor, saying that China's ignoring or rejecting decisions made by international bodies such as the United Nations was similar to a bad neighbour ignoring town council edicts to correct disruptive behaviour.

It ended by calling China's behaviour "egregious" and that China was ignoring "the rules that keep things fair and safe for everyone".

Distortion

China's embassy in Singapore responded on May 21 by sharing a video of China's former ambassador to Singapore Cui Tiankai's interview with CCTV+ in 2024's Shangri La Dialogue, where he stated China's position.

The video was accompanied by a statement which accused the U.S. Embassy in Singapore of "distorting the ins and outs" of the South China Sea Issue.

Citing recent pronouncements by the U.S. in wanting to "seize control" of places such as the Panama Canal and Greenland, said directly by President Donald Trump, the video accused the U.S. of dealing a "body blow to the existing international order.

"The U.S. somehow believes that as a country that refuses to join the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, it has the privilege of microscoping other countries’ compliance with the Convention," it added.

China said that its efforts with Asean countries meant that the situation in the area was stable, contrasted with what it deemed as U.S. actions that destabilised the region, before offering several links to explain the issue further.

Inciting domestic reaction

Singapore's Ministry of Foreign Affairs issued a statement on May 21, saying:

"The Singapore Government rejects attempts by foreign embassies to incite domestic reactions to international issues involving third countries.

Complex issues are best resolved through appropriate channels for effective diplomacy."

The statement reflects Singapore's position that the country is not a claimant state regarding the South China Sea, as expressed by Foreign Minister Vivian Balakrishnan in 2024, who said: "We do not take sides in the competing territorial and maritime claims".

Singapore has regularly stated that its interests were maintaining peace and stability in "one of the world's busiest waterways", and "uphold the right of all states to freedom of navigation and overflight".

At time of writing, both embassies' posts remain online.

Top image via U.S. Embassy Singapore/Facebook & Embassy of the People's Republic of China in Singapore/Facebook