‘China can’t name Philippine Rise undersea features’

MANILA, Philippines — China has no right to name undersea features in the Philippine Rise or Benham Rise, according to a senior magistrate of the Supreme Court.

Senior Associate Justice Antonio Carpio said only the Philippines has the right to name such features since the area has already been declared part of the country’s territory.

“We have sovereign rights over Benham Rise because we have exclusive right to explore and exploit the oil, gas and other mineral resources in that area, which has been confirmed by the UN Commission on the Limits of the Continental Shelf (UNCLCS) as part of the extended continental shelf (ECS) of the Philippines,” the magistrate explained in a statement released over the weekend.

Carpio, who was part of the government’s legal team that earlier handled the protest against China’s incursion in disputed islands in the West Philippine Sea before the Permanent Court of Arbitration (PCA) in The Hague, stressed that the naming of undersea features is covered by guidelines set by the International Hydrographic Organization-Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission (IHO-IOC). 

“Under the guidelines, the Philippines has the preferential right to name undersea features within its exclusive economic zone (EEZ) and ECS,” he stressed.

With this position, Carpio suggested that the government should now name the undersea features in the Philippine Rise, which will be recognized as valid names under IHO-IOC rules.

“However, the Philippines must designate via presidential executive order its government agency that will be responsible for approving names for undersea features within the EEZ and ECS,” he pointed out.

Carpio added that allowing China to name features in an area that is part of Philippine territory would violate the country’s sovereignty and therefore unconstitutional.

Carpio issued the statement after China renamed five undersea features in Philippine Rise in its submissions to the IHO-IOC in October 2015 and September last year.

These are the Jinghao and Tianbao seamounts located 70 nautical miles east of Cagayan province, Haidonquing Seamount further east and the Jujiu Seamount and Cuiqiao Hill, which form the central peaks of the undersea geological province.

Malacañang said last week it does not recognize and will actually protest China’s move.

China claims about 90 percent of the entire South China Sea but it is being contested by Taiwan and four members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) – the Philippines, Vietnam, Malaysia and Brunei.

In 2002, ASEAN and China signed the Declaration on the Conduct of Parties in the South China Sea to address maritime disputes peacefully. More than 14 years have passed since the declaration was signed but parties have yet to craft a binding code of conduct.

 Carpio earlier criticized the policy of the Duterte administration on the territorial dispute with China in the West Philippine Sea for “setting aside” the PCA award won by the Philippines against China.

In its award issued in July 2016, the PCA upheld major submissions of the Philippines, including the declaration of China’s nine-dash line as contrary to the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) and having no statutory basis.

The award also affirmed the Philippines’ stance that China’s move to shoo away Filipino fishermen at the disputed Panatag (Scarborough) Shoal was unlawful.

It also declared that the Panganiban (Mischief) Reef, Ayungin (Second Thomas) Shoal and Recto (Reed) Bank are “part of the EEZ and continental shelf of the Philippines, and are not overlapped by any possible entitlement of China.”

Buhay party-list Rep. Lito Atienza agreed with Carpio, saying the “government should proceed and give Filipino names to every seamount in Benham.”

According to the senior deputy minority leader, “those Chinese labels will not diminish the fact that under international law, Benham is part of the Philippine continental shelf.”

Atienza said the Philippine government was required to tender for approval under the UNCLOS the particulars of the outer limits of the Philippine continental shelf.

 Unlike the disputed territories in the West Philippine Sea, Atienza said no other state was claiming Benham at the time, so the Philippine government’s submission was eventually approved by the UN on April 12, 2012.

With the UN approval, the party-list lawmaker said the Philippines now “enjoys the exclusive right to exploit all living as well as non-living resources inside Benham.” 

Atienza earlier filed a bill proposing to create the Benham Rise Protection and Development Authority “to ensure that all resources that are rightfully ours would not be exploited and abused by other countries claiming these to be their own.” – With Delon Porcalla