‘Countries must be vocal in recognizing South China Sea ruling’

WASHINGTON, DC – Countries should be vocal about the need to follow international law and to honor the 2016 arbitral ruling that voided China’s expansive maritime claim in the disputed South China Sea, according to a United States senior defense official.

Speaking to visiting Filipino journalists in the Pentagon, the official said it is important for all like-minded countries to emphasize through available diplomatic means that there is an international legal body that has spoken about China’s nine-dash line claim and the Philippines’ entitlements under international law.

“It is also important, I think, that all countries continue to say that international law affords certain freedoms to any country and its naval vessels in international waters and we should also be able to enjoy those rights freely, and that it is not valid and it is highly destabilizing when you see countries trying to prevent their neighbors from actually using what they are entitled to under international law,” the official said.

“I think that it is important for the Philippine diplomats, just as American diplomats and diplomats in all countries, to speak out openly to say that there is an international legal ruling that has validated many of the claims that Manila is making and what entitlements it has in the South China Sea,” the official added.

In 2016, a Hague-based arbitral tribunal ruled that China’s historic claims in the South China Sea, which covers about 90 percent of the resource-rich area, has no legal basis.

The landmark decision also affirmed the Philippines’ sovereign rights over its 200-nautical mile exclusive economic zone (EEZ).

Under the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea or UNCLOS, states have sovereign rights to explore, exploit and conserve and manage natural resources within their EEZ.

The arbitral ruling stemmed from a case filed by the administration of the late former president Benigno Aquino III, which regarded China’s claim as “excessive” and “exaggerated.”

China has repeatedly said it would not recognize the ruling, describing it as “illegal” and “a mere piece of paper.”

Despite the ruling, there have been reports about Filipino fishermen experiencing difficulties fishing in the South China Sea because of the presence of Chinese ships.

At recent budget hearings, foreign affairs officials told lawmakers that they have filed hundreds of diplomatic protests against China’s activities in the area.

The defense official said the US continues to publicly remind everyone that it supports the ruling and that it is important for the Philippines to be able to enforce it.

“It matters for the PRC (People’s Republic of China) and all other countries to actually follow through with supporting what the international law has said,” the official said.

“Our message needs to be clear which is – whether it is the 2016 arbitral tribunal ruling, whether it is the UN Law of the Sea, there are very clear principles, rules, entitlements – that are set out in international law and all countries have an obligation to actually abide by those,” the official added.

In a speech before the United Nations General Assembly in 2020, former president Rodrigo Duterte said the Philippines would reject attempts to undermine the arbitral ruling, which he described as “beyond compromise and beyond the reach of passing governments to dilute, diminish or abandon.”

In a speech delivered months after the assembly, however, Duterte, who has been criticized for supposedly being too soft on China, claimed that the arbitral decision is just a piece of paper that can be thrown in the wastebasket.

Last September, President Marcos vowed not to abandon even a square inch of Philippine territory to any foreign power.

Malaysia, Brunei, Vietnam and Taiwan also have overlapping claims in the South China Sea, where more than $5 trillion in ship-borne trade passes through every year.