
Originally Posted by
inxss4
Treaty Law
Given its proximity to the Philippines, common sense dictates that the Shoal is laying within Philippine territorial waters -- not that of China -- and international law is on the side of the Philippines. The Treaty of Paris of 1898, The Treaty of Washington of 1900, and the Treaty with Great Britain of 1930 all state that the westernmost limit of Philippines territory is the 118th degree meridian of longitude east of Greenwich, arguably excluding Scarborough. But even as the 1935 Philippine Constitution (and, by definition, all subsequent constitutions) affirms the legality or legitimacy of these treaties, constitutional provisions however do assert that Philippine national territory is comprised of the "Philippine archipelago, with all the islands and waters embraced therein, and all other territories over which the Philippines has sovereignty or jurisdiction."
At present, the Philippines is building a case for unilateral submission to the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea (ITLOS) sitting in Hamburg, one of the dispute resolution mechanisms under the 1982 United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) of which both China and the Philippines are signatories. UNCLOS provides for a 200 nautical mile "exclusive economic zone" and "continental shelf" which effectively places Scarborough within Philippine sovereignty or jurisdiction. The Philippine claim is further strengthened, yet not without controversy, by Republic Act No. 9522, known as the Philippine Archipelagic Baselines Law. Said to be compliant with UNCLOS, this law defined Philippine territory by connecting straight lines from the outermost points of the outermost islands of the Philippine archipelago.
The Philippine Archipelagic Baselines Law was considered a "sell out" by the administration of former President Arroyo, who signed the bill into law in 2009. But the Law creates a domestic legal conflict in that its baselines allegedly contradict the 1987 Philippine Constitution by decreasing the size of the nation's territory. Oddly, today, the Philippine government is using this law as the basis for its claim on Scarborough by classifying the territory as a "regime of islands" over which it exercises sovereignty and jurisdiction.