‘RP should sue Jakarta for sinking ships’

The Philippines should sue Indonesia for its "unjustified" act of sinking four Philippine fishing vessels in the Sulawesi Sea on Jan. 27, an international law expert said yesterday.

Professor H. Harry Roque of the University of the Philippines told The STAR Manila ought to sue Jakarta before the International Court on the Law of the Sea (ICLS) in Hamburg, Germany and seek reparation for the four fishing vessels.

The four ships were scuttled by Indonesian navy warships in the Sulawesi Sea for allegedly poaching on Indonesian waters and their crew of 49 fishermen were arrested and detained in an Indonesian naval station in Manado.

But Foreign Affairs Secretary Blas Ople said in a statement that Manila would pursue a dialogue with Jakarta to settle the dispute.

"For any issue to be resolved, it is important to first establish mutually acceptable frameworks and mechanisms from whence talks can proceed. We have already done that with Indonesia," Ople said in a terse statement.

He cited the third meeting in December last year of the Joint Commission for Bilateral Cooperation which "created a special joint working group to address maritime and ocean concerns, which include boundary delineations."

Jakarta, for its part, agreed to release the arrested fishermen and they arrived in Davao City yesterday after 10 days of detention in Manado.

But Roque suggested it may be time to pursue more active measures for the Philippines to seek reparation for the scuttled ships.

"Under the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, both countries have committed to resort to peaceful means to settle their disputes arising from the convention," Roque said, citing Article 279 of the UNCLOS.

But instead of finding relief before the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in the Hague, Netherlands, Roque said the Philippines has a better chance of finding relief before the ICLS in Hamburg.

He explained that Manila can only file a claim before the ICJ if Indonesia consents to settle the matter before the ICJ. Such consent is not necessary before the ICLS.

Roque explained that under Article 292 of the UNCLOS, Indonesia may only seize the fishing vessel and arrest and afterwards, release both vessel and complement upon the posting of cash bond.

Roque held that under Article 31 of the UNCLOS, the Philippines may demand full reparation from Indonesia on behalf of its citizens who suffered damages as a result of the sinking.

While the Department of Foreign Affairs did not comment on Roque’s suggestion to sue Indonesia for reparations, DFA maritime expert Alberto Encomienda, secretary general of the Maritime and Ocean Affairs Center (MOAC), said the priority should be to start hydrographic charting of the country and its possessions.

Encomienda echoed Ople’s statement that Manila is continuously negotiating with Jakarta on territorial boundaries and overlapping jurisdictions.