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Link here: https://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=1300&dat=19770804&id=FApVAAAAIBAJ&pg=6757%2C920336&hl=en
Excerpt:
Kuala Lumpur, August 4 1977 – The Philippines today announced it was taking ‘definite steps’ to end a 14 year territorial dispute with Malaysia over Sabah
The Philippine claim to a large part of the East Malaysia State has been an underlying and potentially explosive source of tension in the region north of Australia.
The announcement was made by President Marcos at the opening of the second summit of Government heads from the Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN), linking Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore and Thailand.
He said in the interests of regional harmony his Government ‘is taking definite steps to eliminate one of the burdens of ASEAN – the claim of the Philippine Republic to Sabah’.
The statement fell short of a final and unconditional renunciation of the Philippines’ claim to sovereignty over more than one third of Malaysiya’s territory.
But it was immediately welcomed by the Malaysian Prime Minister, Datuk Hussein Onn.
Singapore’s Prime Minister, Mr. Lee Kuan Yew, described the Philippines gesture as ‘momentous’. He said it had added great substance to the purpose of the summit.
The Philippine and Malaysian leaders are due to meet privately tomorrow morning. It is not yet clear whether Manila is attaching any conditions to its formula for settling the Sabah dispute.
But Philippine sources say acknowledgement of Malaysia’s de jure control of the State would involve an amendment to the Philippine Constitution through a plebiscite.
Excerpt from Wikipedia’s article ‘North Borneo Dispute’, link HERE.
Attempts at withdrawing claim
At the ASEAN Summit on 4 August 1977, Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos announced that the Philippines would take “definite steps to eliminate one of the burdens of Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) — the claim of the Philippine Republic to Sabah”.[47][48] The statement, however was not followed through,[49] despite negotiations[50] and reassurances made by Marcos again in 1984 with Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad.[48]
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