The South China Sea Dispute

The South China Sea Dispute After the landmark ruling by the Permanent Court of Arbitration (PCA) in The Hague against China's claims over the South China Sea, Beijing predictably had rejected the ruling with characteristic fierceness, questioning the Court s jurisdiction over the dispute. It has aggressively declared to protect its territorial sovereignty and maritime rights and interests, while its State media had called the Court a puppet of e ter al for es . India, still smarting from Chi a s lo ki g of its NSG entry, advised all nations (read China) resolve the dispute peacefully without resorting to threat of use of force. The US, which has signed but not yet ratified the 1982 UN Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) on which the ruling was based, urged the disputant parties to comply with the final and legally binding ruling and to avoid provocations. India probably has a right to assume the high moral ground in the case. It has already abided by a ruling by the same Court in 2014 that awarded to Bangladesh nearly 80 percent of an area sprawling over 25,000 sq. kms disputed between the two countries for over a decade for economic exploitation for oil-exploration and fishing. But the big powers behaved no different from China whenever any decision by an international tribunal went against their interests, with an identical refrain about the jurisdiction of such a tribunal. Britain did the same in its dispute with Mauritius last year, and in the 1980s, when the International Court of Justice (ICJ) at The Hague had ruled against the United States for violating international law by supporting the Nicaraguan right-wing rebels, the Contras, and by i i g Ni aragua aters duri g that ou tr s i il o flict, the US reaction was no different. The PCA, established in 1899 by the first Hague Peace Conference is one of the oldest institutions for international dispute resolutions. It predates the ICJ, also located at the Peace palace in The Hague, which was established as a judicial organ of the UN in 1945 by the UN Charter. Even though the rulings of the PCA or ICJ are supposed to be legally binding, there is no power of enforcement though military action like a multinational Peace Keeping Force or otherwise. It is therefore no wonder that international justice works more to the advantage of the biggies and less for those having lesser global clout. But in the present case the ruling throws up the possibility of escalation of fresh tension and confrontation in the region. To go to the root of the problem, China has always claimed a huge swath of the South China Sea (SCS) as its own territory. With $5 trillion or one-third of global trade flowing through the area every year and fishing equivalent to 12 percent of the global catch, besides the potential for huge reserves of undersea oil and gas, SCS is one of the most important strategic and commercial hotspots in the world. Understandably, the area is among the most fiercely disputed in the world, with rival claims by Brunei, Malaysia, Vietnam and Taiwan, apart from China and the Philippines. China claims sovereignty over almost all the islands, reefs and rocks in the SCS — including those located hundreds of miles away from the its shores. To legitimise its territorial claims and assert its i disputa le so ereig t o er the area, China has feverishly embarked on a massive island-building spree since 2014, by piling sand on the submerged reefs and rocks and transforming uninhabitable specks on the sea into military bases equipped with proper infrastructure. There are two main island chains - the Paracels and the Spratlys disputed between rival nations – besides dozens of rocky outcrops, atolls, sandbanks and reefs. China has laid claims to a number of islands in the SCS, turned at least seven reefs and rocks into nascent military outposts, built airbases on them while installing powerful radar and missile launchers. International law, or the UNCLOS to which China and the Philippines are both signatories - allows a nation to exercise sovereignty over waters up to 12 nautical miles from its coast, and grants it exclusive economic rights within 200 nautical miles from its coast. But the Convention says that only natural islands that can sustain human habitation may qualify for such maritime rights - reefs that are entirely submerged at high tide and artificial islands cannot be used for asserting and justifying these rights. The Philippines took China to the PCA in January 2013 after the Chinese navy had wrested control of Scarborough Shoal, a submerged chain of reefs and rocks in the rich fishing waters off the Philippine island of Luzon, more than 400 nautical miles from the Chinese island province of Hainan and just 120 nautical miles from the Philippine coast. The PCA has now ruled that none of these reef and rock features are islands within the scope of UNCLOS, in effect telling China to stop its activities in the waters surrounding its island bases in the SCS. It virtually rejected Chinese claims over the South China Sea on the basis of what China considers its historical rights, something that follows from a map drawn by it after the defeat of Japan in the Second World War, with an ambiguous nine-dash-line that stretches south fro Chi a s Hai a isla d, encircling almost 90 per cent area of the SCS. Though China has so far desisted from drawing any continuous line clearly marking its claim, it asserts control over the area that it says the Chinese fishermen have been using for centuries. The PCA has now ruled that there was no evidence that China had historic rights to the waters or resources that fell within its nine-dash line , and that it was violating the Philippine's sovereign rights with its operations in the SCS. The area has always been a potential flashpoint. Recent decades have seen military flare-ups between Vietnam and China, besides stand-offs between the Philippines and China since 2012. In 1974, China seized the Paracels from Vietnam, killing more than 40 people. Again in 1988, China and Vietnam clashed over the Spratlys, with Vietnam losing over 60 men. In taking the dispute to the PCA in 2013, in which China refused to participate sa i g it as a law-a usi g tri u al and terming its proceedings a far e , the Philippines was only trying to avoid a similar military confrontation with China. While signing the UNCLOS in 1996, China was certainly aware that signing the Convention would entail gi i g up its histori al territorial claims over the SCS, but that was the period when it was seeking global acceptance and respectability. Now it probably feels powerful enough and having enough global clout to ignore the treaty, which it even might renounce after the present ruling. Its efforts at garnering international diplomatic support in this dispute have so far met with limited success – except for partial support from Russia, the support has so far remained confined to a few African and small island nations that are heavily dependent on Chinese economic support – like Angola, Madagascar and Papua New Guinea. This may not be convincing enough for it to claim that justice and righteousness always have popular support . While the European Union and other countries have advised it to accept the verdict, the ruling clearly weakens the Chinese position in the ASEAN, in whose meetings China has repeatedly blocked all discussions over its claims on the South China Sea. After all, refusal to abide by the ruling also undermines Chi a s own position and commitment to a rule-based global order that befits a superpower status that China claims for itself. After the ruling, now there are two alternative courses open before China. Eager to reinforce its superpower status, it may turn more aggressive and further militarise the islands it claims as its sovereign territory in the SCS, risking confrontation with its neighbours and also with the United States. Such confrontation may even escalate into a conflict. China has repeatedly blamed the United States, which is engaged in military ties with the Philippines, for stirring up trouble in the Sea. The US Navy has already conducted several freedom of navigation exercises there, sending warships within 12 nautical miles of islands, reefs and rocks controlled by China. China may now deploy more military might and upgrade its construction on islands; it may even impose restrictions on air traffic movement over the Sea. If it does that, it will obviously force the US to deploy its aircraft carriers which it already has i the i i it . It ill defi itel push Chi a s Asia eigh ours i to the US a is, so ethi g Chi a would abhor to see. The other, and the only pragmatic alternative, is therefore for China to work towards reduction in the existing tensions. Philippines probably will use the ruling to exact economic and other prices from China in the form of Chinese investment rather than getting into direct confrontation with its powerful neighbour, especially after the election of its new President Rodrigo Duterte. China may try, and even win over the other rival claimants in the Sea in making them acknowledge its sovereignty over the disputed islands in return for a promise for their continued equitable access to the rich fishing grounds, besides joint development and harnessing of the natural resources like oil and gas and other material rewards. But the world may be prepared to expect some heat and smoke, but hopefully no fire.