PCG: No permanent blindness to personnel in China’s laser attack

MANILA, Philippines — The Philippine Coast Guard (PCG) personnel who were victims of a laser attack by the China Coast Guard (CCG) did not become permanently blind, its spokesperson said on Friday.

It can be recalled that on February 6, a PCG vessel was attacked by the Chinese Coast Guard by using a green laser in Ayungin Shoal in the West Philippine Sea.

Commodore Jay Tarriela, PCG spokesperson for the West Philippine Sea, said the crew was rendered temporarily blind for 10-15 seconds because of the military-grade laser light blasted into their direction.

“By the time they had arrived at port, they were checked by the medical officers by the Philippine Coast Guard,”  Tariella said in an INQSide Look interview.

“So far right now there is no permanent impairment of their vision,” he added.

The PCG vessel was supporting a rotation and resupply mission of the Philippine Navy in Ayungin Shoal in the WPS, where the country maintains its presence through the BRP Sierra Madre,  a commissioned vessel that hosted a small contingent of military personnel to assert the country’s claim to the disputed waters since 1999.

China claims almost all of the South China Sea, including the WPS.

But in 2016, the United Nations-backed Permanent Court of Arbitration in The Hague invalidated China’s claim to almost the entire South China Sea.

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