In opening comments to the tribunal in the Hague on yesterday, Foreign Secretary Albert del Rosario said the Philippines had sought judicial intervention because China’s behaviour had become increasingly “aggressive” and negotiations had proved futile.
Del Rosario said the UN’s Convention on the Law of the Sea, which the Philippines and China have both ratified, should be used to resolve their bitter territorial dispute. “The case before you is of the utmost importance to the Philippines, to the region, and to the world,” del Rosario told the tribunal.
“In our view, it is also of utmost significance to the integrity of the convention, and to the very fabric of the legal order of the seas and oceans.”
China insists it has sovereign rights to nearly all of the South China Sea, a strategically vital waterway with shipping lanes through which about a third of all the world’s traded oil passes. Its claim, based on ancient Chinese maps, reaches close to the coasts of its southern neighbours.
The Philippines, Vietnam, Malaysia, Brunei and Taiwan also have claims to parts of the sea, which have for decades made it a potential military flashpoint. Tensions have risen sharply in recent years as a rising China has sought to stake its claims more assertively.
Following a stand-off between Chinese ships and the weak Filipino Navy in 2012, China took control of a rich fishing ground called Scarborough Shoal that is within the Philippines’ exclusive economic zone.