By Neil Jerome Morales

MANILA (Reuters) – The armed forces of five countries conducted joint maritime exercises in a portion of the South China Sea on Saturday as China carried out its own military drills in the disputed waterway.

The exercises involving the Philippines, United States, Australia, Japan and – for the first time – New Zealand took place in Manila’s exclusive economic zone and sought to improve the militaries’ interoperability, the Philippine armed forces said in a statement.

Saturday’s exercises included a Philippine warship, the United States’ USS Howard, Japan’s JS Sazanami, and New Zealand’s HMNZS Aotearoa, it added.

Australia’s Department of Defence said the drills demonstrated “our collective commitment to strengthen regional and international cooperation in support of a peaceful, stable and prosperous Indo-Pacific”.

The exercises follow a series of air and sea encounters between the Philippines and China, which have sparred over disputed areas of the South China Sea, including the Scarborough Shoal, one of Asia’s most contested features. The shoal has been occupied by China’s coast guard for more than a decade.

On Wednesday, naval vessels from New Zealand and Australia sailed through the Taiwan Strait, part of the South China Sea.

China, which claims democratically governed Taiwan as its own, says it alone exercises sovereignty and jurisdiction over the strait. Both the U.S. and Taiwan say the strait – a major trade route through which about half of global container ships pass – is an international waterway.

Australia has “consistently pressed China on peace and stability in the South China Sea and Taiwan Strait”, Australian Foreign Minister Penny Wong said in a speech to the U.N. General Assembly on Saturday.

“We have welcomed the resumption of leader and military level dialogue between the U.S. and China,” Wong said, according to a transcript.

Chinese air and naval forces conducted manoeuvres in a disputed area of the sea hours after the country’s top diplomat discussed ways of reducing regional tension with his U.S. counterpart.

China claims nearly all of the South China Sea, despite overlapping maritime claims by Brunei, Malaysia, the Philippines and Vietnam, angering its neighbours.

(Reporting by Neil Jerome Morales; Editing by Himani Sarkar and Helen Popper)