New accord establishes a hotline Chinese and Philippine presidents can use to stop clashes at sea

A recently signed agreement will open a direct line of communication between China and the Philippines’ presidential offices to try and prevent any new confrontation from spiraling out of control in the disputed South China Sea. A copy of the highlights of the accord was seen Tuesday by The Associated Press. China and the Philippines have forged such emergency telephone hotlines at lower levels of their bureaucracies in the past but the territorial faceoffs have persisted uncontrollably in the past year.