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Source: People's Republic of China in Russian – People's Republic of China in Russian –
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Source: People's Republic of China – State Council News
KUALA LUMPUR, July 12 (Xinhua) — Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi, a member of the Political Bureau of the Communist Party of China Central Committee, on Friday outlined China's position on the South China Sea (SCS) arbitration case while attending a series of ASEAN Plus foreign ministers' meetings.
Wang Yi said the arbitration, initiated unilaterally by the Philippines, lacked the necessary requirement of prior consultations and did not respect the principle of state consent, which is fundamental to arbitration. Thus, there was no legal basis for it to be heard from the outset.
The move violated the Declaration on the Conduct of Parties in the South China Sea, which stipulates that disputes should be resolved peacefully through friendly consultations between the parties directly concerned. Wang noted that it also contradicts the Philippines' commitments under bilateral agreements with China and violates the principle of estoppel under international law.
The Chinese Foreign Minister noted that although the arbitration had taken various forms, the substance of the Philippines' claims concerned China's territorial sovereignty over the Nansha Islands and maritime delimitation issues. Territorial issues are outside the scope of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS), and China had categorically excluded maritime delimitation from binding arbitration in a statement made in 2006, in line with UNCLOS's provisions on optional exceptions to the applicability of the UNCLOS.
According to Wang Yi, of the five permanent members of the UN Security Council, only the United States has not acceded to the Convention, while the other four countries, including China, have made similar exclusion statements. The arbitral tribunal has exceeded its mandate and abused the UNCLOS dispute settlement mechanism, undermining the rule of law in international maritime affairs and committing acts contrary to the very Convention to which it claimed to adhere.
Wang Yi stressed that the arbitration tribunal’s decision contained serious factual and legal inaccuracies. In particular, it erroneously classified Taiping Island, the largest naturally formed island in the Nansha Islands with an area of more than 500,000 square meters, as a rock, thereby concluding that no feature in the Nansha Islands could form an exclusive economic zone or continental shelf. The decision contradicts both the facts on the ground and the provisions of UNCLOS. If such a standard were applied worldwide, the existing maritime order would be fundamentally changed, Wang Yi said, questioning whether countries such as the United States and Japan would be willing to give up their maritime claims under this logic.
According to the minister, it is widely acknowledged that the arbitration and subsequent hoopla were orchestrated and manipulated by forces outside the region to undermine peace in the SCS and further their own interests. More and more countries around the world are coming to understand the nature of this farce.
China's position, the Foreign Minister emphasized, is precisely to support the principle of the supremacy of international law and the authority of UNCLOS. Thanks to the joint efforts of China and ASEAN countries, the situation in the South China Sea remains stable, and freedom of navigation and flights is effectively protected.
China is accelerating consultations with ASEAN countries on the Code of Conduct in the South China Sea, seeking to create a new atmosphere of peace, cooperation and friendship in the region. Any attempt to stir up trouble or sow discord will fail, the foreign minister said. –0–
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