Archive - South China Sea

  By ELLEN  T. TORDESILLAS The Philippine case against China’s nine-dash line before the United Nations Arbitral Tribunal gained support from Vietnam in a statement it submitted to the court in The Hague on Thursday. The Vietnam Foreign Ministry said the tribunal has jurisdiction to settle disputes concerning the interpretation of the U.N. Convention on

    By HARRY  L. ROQUE  TWO years after the Philippines initiated arbitration proceedings against China under the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea, China belatedly published in the web site of its Ministry of Foreign Affairs its official Position Paper on the arbitration. The Chinese position was divided into three. First, that

    BY ELLEN T. TORDESILLAS THE Position Paper of China on the case filed by the Philippines with the United Nations Arbitral Tribunal showed the wide gap between the two countries as regards their conflicting claims on th South China Sea islands, reefs and rocks. The meeting between President Aquino and Chinese President Xi

  By ELLEN TORDESILLAS CHINA insisted Sunday that the United Nations Arbitral Tribunal has no jurisdiction on the complaint filed by the Philippines seeking to declare null and void the nine-dash line on China’s maps. China’s 27-page position paper, posted on the website of its Ministry of Foreign Affairs, came eight days before the Dec.

  By  ELLEN T. TORDESILLAS CHINA’s 9-dashed line map, which was recently expanded to 10 dashes, goes against the “concept of global commons” which was the foundation of the 1982 United Nations Convention of the Law of the Sea, Senior Associate Justice Antonio Carpio said in a speech delivered on the 75th Anniversary of the

By ELLEN TORDESILLAS STATEMENTS coming from Foreign Secretary Albert del Rosario betray helplessness over the situation in the South China Sea. The Philippines is losing the battle that he led the country to wage against China. Last Thursday Del Rosario said that the Philippines will ask the United Nations Arbitral Court to hasten the resolution

By ELLEN T. TORDESILLAS USING China’s very own ancient maps, Justice Antonio T. Carpio debunked the Asian superpower’s ownership claims of almost the whole of South China Sea based on “historical facts.” In a lecture at De La Salle University “Historical Facts, Historical Lies and Historical Rights in the West Philippine Sea,” Carpio took up

By ELLEN T. TORDESILLAS THE current tension in the South China Sea triggered by China’s territorial assertiveness underscores the military weakness of the Philippines and the lack of direction of its foreign policy as against Vietnam’s focused moves backed up by a credible defense capacity. There are three incidents or conflicts going on in South

By ELLEN TORDESILLAS THE Philippines submitted its Memorial before the Arbitral Tribunal of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea in The Hague, Netherlands in the suit it filed to nullify China’s 9-dash line map, Foreign Secretary Albert del Rosario said today. China’s reaction:http://www.fmprc.gov.cn/eng/xwfw/s2510/t1142356.shtml Del Rosario said the 4,000 page Memorial consisting

DESPITE Chinese requests to delay it, the Philippines is filing on March 30 its memorandum challenging before the United Nations China’s territorial claims over the South China Sea. The memorandum, called a Memorial in international law, will be filed with the Arbitral Tribunal of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) at

THE rising tension at the Ayungin shoal, just 21 nautical miles from Mischief Reef where China has built fortifications, could be a test on the usefulness of the 1951 PH-US Mutual Defense Treaty In its statement issued last Friday, the Department of Foreign Affairs said:  “The BRP Sierra Madre, a commissioned Philippine Naval Vessel, was

“There can no longer be any legal dispute that the fully submerged Reed Bank, which is where the rich reserves of gas is located, belongs exclusively to the Philippines, being within 200 nautical miles from Palawan and more than 800 nautical miles from China. The resolution of the legal issue is important for investors,” Carpio said.

A state-owned Chinese oil firm has rejected the proposal of business tycoon Manuel V. Pangilinan to invest in a contract to drill in the disputed Reed Bank but welcomed “innovative” proposals on how it can participate, according to a memorandum Pangilinan submitted to President Benigno Aquino.

By TESSA JAMANDRE FOUR members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) with claims in the South China Sea failed to take a united stand on China’s growing aggressiveness after Brunei opted out of a recently held meeting in Manila. Brunei was a no-show in the 1st ASEAN Claimants Working Group Meeting held at

By TESSA JAMANDRE CHINA is sending a new ambassador to Manila at a time of strained Philippine-Chinese relations, with the Philippines preparing to step up its territorial claims against China before the international arbitral tribunal. Ambassador Zhao Jinhua, a 48-year-old diplomat who carved his career from the Asian Affairs Department of China’s Foreign Ministry, is

  By ELLEN TORDESILLAS ALARM  bells rang again with the announcement last week by China that Hainan, its southernmost province, was implementing a Fishery Law that requires foreign fishing boats to get its approval when venturing into the South China Sea starting Jan. 1, 2014. Hainan, with an area of 32,900 square kilometers, is China’s