The Philippines said on Saturday it had filed a protest with Beijing for reclaiming land on a disputed South China Sea reef, the fourth such complaint in three months.

The new protest over reclamation at the McKeenan Reef in the Spratly Islands chain further heats up an increasingly tense dispute over the waters where China has been accused of using bullying tactics against other claimants.

A U.S. official proposed Wednesday that China and Southeast Asian nations call a moratorium on actions seen as provocative in a bid to cool tensions in the South China Sea.

Danny Russel, the top U.S. diplomat on East Asia, said he made the suggestion as "food for thought" and not as a formal proposal as he met regional counterparts in Myanmar to prepare for a regional summit later this year.

A Philippine Islamic militant on the U.S. government's "most wanted" list was arrested in a Manila slum on Wednesday, authorities said, seven years after he spectacularly broke out of jail.

Khair Mundos, who had a $500,000 U.S. government reward on his head, was detained in a rundown Muslim quarter near the capital's airport where he was staying with relatives, the police and military said after a joint raid.

The Philippines on Saturday said it was investigating signs that China was reclaiming land on disputed South China Sea reefs but stressed it would not be provoked into a rash response.

President Benigno Aquino's spokeswoman Abigail Valte said the government was looking into reports that the Chinese were damaging the reefs in an alleged effort to turn two remote outcrops in the sea into islands.

South Korea will donate a corvette warship to the poorly-equipped Philippine navy amid growing tensions -- particularly with China -- over maritime territorial disputes in the region, the government said Thursday.

The "Pohang-class corvette" will be decommissioned by the end of the year and donated to the Philippines, the Department of Foreign Affairs in Manila said in a statement issued this week.

Eight women died in the Philippine capital on Friday as a fire engulfed a building in which they had been locked in by their employer, police said.

Eight other women survived the blaze by climbing to the roof of the two-storey building and jumping off, said police officer Cris Gabutin, an investigator in the case.

Six members of the same family died after a fire struck a tent city set up for survivors of Super Typhoon Haiyan in the Philippines on Wednesday, a police official said.

The blaze broke out in a tent housing a couple and their six children in the central city of Tacloban after their home was destroyed by last year's typhoon, said Chief Superintendent Henry Losanes, the area's police chief.

The Philippines denied Tuesday it was spying on Qatar, after three Filipinos were convicted of espionage in the Gulf state.

One man was sentenced to death and two to life in jail after a court found them guilty of leaking information that could threaten Qatar's national security, foreign department spokesman Charles Jose said.

The Philippines said Monday three Filipinos had been convicted of espionage in Qatar, with one sentenced to death and the others to life in jail.

The trio were sentenced last month by a local court for selling information deemed threatening to Qatar's national security, foreign department spokesman Charles Jose said.

Gunmen shot dead a radio broadcaster in the violence-stricken southern Philippines on Friday -- the latest in a string of deadly attacks on journalists, police said.

Samuel Oliverio was driving his motorcycle with his wife riding pillion when he was attacked by two men on another motorcycle in Digos city, about 960 kilometres (597 miles) south of the Philippine capital.