Nene seeks all-senator caucus on baselines nat'l territory body

MANILA, Philippines – Minority Leader Aquilino Pimentel Jr. called yesterday for a caucus to unfreeze two bills seeking to define the nation’s archipelagic baselines and create a commission on national territory.

The bills were frozen by the Senate foreign relations committee chaired by Sen. Miriam Defensor-Santiago.

Pimentel fears that the Philippines might not be able to define its baselines under the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) before May 2009, the deadline set by the UN.

“We want to discuss this right away so that we can establish our claim over the Spratlys (Kalayaan Island Group) and Scarborough (Shoal),” he said. 

“(But) Miriam was not prepared even to accept the idea of having a caucus. I want this approved as soon as possible.”

Pimentel said the Senate minority would come out with a collective position on the baselines issue as senators began debating on Santiago’s resolution seeking to create a commission on national territory.

“In my view, we are not going to war versus China (which also claims KIG and the whole of South China Sea).

“We are only saying that if we are wrong, let the UN tell us where we are wrong so we can adjust accordingly. We must assert that claim.”

Pimentel said the Philippines might expand its territory under the UNCLOS because of the extended continental shelf, which was not included in the Treaty of Paris that defined the country’s borders.

“The deadline – I don’t think it’s an empty deadline because other countries like New Zealand, Indonesia and Papua New Guinea are following (it),” he said.

Pimentel said the Senate and House of Representatives could approve a baselines bill now while the congressional commission being proposed by Santiago was conducting a study with the help of experts.

“Considering all the circumstances, the study may be done simultaneously with the debates on the baselines definition bill. It is my impression that there is an urgency to define the baselines,” he said.

Pimentel said he has proposed to Santiago that the issue be resolved in a caucus of all the senators.

“My stand is let us discuss it in a caucus. Whether all senators understand every single item in the proposal or not, at least we can tackle this in a less confrontational way,” he said.

Pimentel said he has the support of Senators Juan Ponce Enrile, Edgardo Angara, Rodolfo Biazon, Antonio Trillanes IV and Panfilo Lacson to start deliberations on the archipelagic baselines bill.

“The Senate leadership should decide what to do with the baselines bill,” he said.

“Obviously, they should not be allowed to lie fallow in the bowels of the Senate archives like the arid fields of the African desert.”

Pimentel said that under the UNCLOS, the Philippines is entitled to the following:

• Territorial sea of 12 nautical miles;

• Contiguous zone of additional 12 miles to the territorial sea;

• Exclusive economic zone of 200 miles; and

• Extended continental shelf up to 350 miles.

Upon the advice of the Department of Foreign Affairs, Malacañang is opposed to a bill, already approved on second reading by the House of Representatives and pending with the Senate, seeking to put Kalayaan Island Group and Scarborough Shoal within the archipelagic baselines.

Instead, the Palace wants to treat the disputed territories as “regime of islands” to which the Philippines has sovereign claim.

However, Pimentel said it would be foolhardy for the Philippines to place these islands outside of the archipelagic map, considering that Kalayaan Island Group had been claimed by the country by right of discovery and occupancy for several decades and the islands had also been a municipality of Palawan since 1978.

Scarborough shoal is very near Luzon and has been settled in by Filipinos even earlier than Kalayaan.

Under Santiago’s proposal, the commission will conduct the study until December this year, after which the bills will be tackled.

This way, the lawmakers would be knowledgeable about the issue being discussed, she added.

Santiago said the deadline would be met since Congress would still have a few months to work on the bills after the commission had completed its job.

She was not prepared to tackle the baselines bills filed by Pimentel, Angara, Enrile, Biazon and Trillanes without a scientific study and assessment of defining the territory under UNCLOS when the Constitution had already delineated the country’s baselines, Santiago said.