MANILA, Philippines (AP) — The Philippines has asked a United Nations body to formally recognize the extent of its undersea continental seabed in the South China Sea, where it would have exclusive rights to exploit resources, the ministry said of the State Department on Saturday: in a move that rejects China’s vast territorial claims on the region.
The Philippine government has submitted information to the UN Commission on the Limits of the Continental Shelf on the extent of the submarine shelf in the South China Sea, off the western province of Palawan, after more than a decade and a half of scientific research.
China did not immediately comment but is likely to contest the Philippine move.
The undersea region where the Philippines wants to formally establish its sovereign rights under the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea, or UNCLOS, includes the Spratlys, a chain of islands, islets, reefs and atolls that has been fiercely contested over the years by China, the Philippines, Vietnam, Malaysia, Brunei and Taiwan. Indonesia has also faced Chinese coast guard and fishing fleets in the gas-rich Natuna Sea on the edge of the South China Sea.
“Incidents in the waters tend to overshadow the importance of what lies beneath,” Philippine Undersecretary of Foreign Affairs Marshal Louis Alferez said. “The seabed and subsurface extending from our archipelago to the maximum extent permitted by UNCLOS contain significant potential resources that will benefit our nation and our people for generations to come.”
“Today we secure our future by manifesting our exclusive right to explore and exploit natural resources within our extensive rights to the continental shelf,” Alferez said.
Under the 1982 UN treaty, a coastal state could have exclusive rights to exploit resources on its continental shelf, a vast stretch of seabed that can extend as far as 350 nautical miles (648 kilometers), including the right to engage in any drilling to stand and regulate. .
The Philippines’ submarine continental shelf could potentially overlap with that of other coastal states in the South China Sea, including Vietnam. Philippine officials have expressed willingness to hold talks to resolve such issues under UNCLOS.
Philippine Permanent Representative to the UN Antonio Lagdameo said the move could “reinvigorate efforts by states to demonstrate their willingness to pursue UNCLOS processes in establishing maritime rights and promote a rules-based international order promote.”
Hostilities and tensions in the disputed waters have escalated alarmingly since last year, especially between China and the Philippines over two disputed shoals. Chinese coast guard ships and suspected militia vessels have deployed powerful water cannons and dangerous blocking maneuvers against Philippine coast guard patrol ships and naval boats, injuring Philippine naval personnel, damaging their supply boats and straining diplomatic ties between the two countries.
After a tense standoff between Philippine and Chinese ships near a shoal in 2012, the Philippines took its disputes with China to international arbitration the following year. The arbitration panel invalidated China’s claim to virtually the entire South China Sea in a 2016 ruling, but Beijing refused to participate in the arbitration, rejected the decision and continues to defy it.
