‘China may engage in quiet talks with Phl over territorial dispute’

WASHINGTON – China’s leaders may decide to engage in quiet negotiations with the Philippines to entice it to withdraw its bid for international arbitration in the South China Sea given the risks and ramifications of other options open to Beijing, the Center for a New American Security (CNAS) said.

Doing so, however, would require Beijing to give Manila something meaningful, such as renewed access to Scarborough (Panatag) Shoal, assurances that Philippine oil and gas development can proceed without harassment and a pledge that negotiations on a final outcome will continue in good faith, said CNAS analyst Peter Dutton in an article.

Such negotiations can only be successful if the Philippines acts as a discreet and reasonable negotiating partner, he said.

If Beijing chooses this approach, and if Manila engages in quiet diplomacy, then there is some hope that a productive accommodation can be reached. In that event, international litigation will have served President Aquino’s purpose to find a peaceful and rules-based resolution of disputes in accordance with international law, Dutton said.

He said this option was one of four the Chinese may be considering since rejecting Manila’s request for international arbitration.

The other three are: Reverse course and litigate the issue which was unlikely, continue to refrain from participating and hope for a favorable outcome which was the most likely (if China loses the case, it could declare the process void and ignore its results), isolate and coerce the Philippines into dropping the arbitration which could backfire by increasing international disapproval of China’s position.

The Philippines lost control of Panatag Shoal and access to its resources in mid-2012 after China projected its superior maritime law enforcement fleet and the sheer number of its civilian fishing vessels to overwhelm the few Philippine vessels present in the area.

The shoal is 124 nautical miles from Zambales province, well within the Philippines’ 200 nautical miles exclusive economic zone (EEZ) and continental shelf but China insists it has sovereignty over the area.

If the arbitration goes forward, Beijing, which has rejected the process, may be at a disadvantage because Chinese assertions about their South China Sea rights are not well supported in international law, Dutton said.

In a separate article on March 28, Patrick Cronin, senior director of the CNAS Asia-Pacific Security Program, said the security situation in the East and South China Seas has deteriorated over the past 16 months against the backdrop of US rebalancing to the Asia-Pacific region.

China’s assertiveness is growing, tensions in each of the seas have spilled over and produced suspicions in the other.

While these tensions appear manageable and are unlikely to trigger war, except through miscalculation or accident, they are trending in an unfavorable direction, he said.

The disputes in the South China Sea have divided ASEAN between the four claimant states of Vietnam, the Philippines, Malaysia and Brunei on one side, and the six non-claimant states on the other, he said.

In addition, the non-claimant states have widely varying degrees of opposition to the claimant states, often depending on their ties with China and the United States, Cronin said.

Washington’s policy towards the region currently focuses on establishing a rules-based international system, but it is robbed of moral authority by the failure of the US Senate to ratify the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS).

Cronin said the main conservative argument that ratification would buttress the creation of a faceless, unaccountable international bureaucracy has some validity, but the best way to address that concern is by joining and then shaping the administrative body.

The US needs to fully participate in shaping effective institutions for global problems, he said, adding the problems of the East and South China Seas are not simply local problems to be left to the largest local power.

More important, the US cannot be persuasive if it criticizes others for not using the dispute mechanisms of UNCLOS when it has not even ratified the agreement.                

Patience

In Manila, Chinese ambassador Ma Keqing called for “patience” in resolving the territorial dispute between China and the Philippines even as she appealed for greater dialogue on the issue.

“We respect each other and should also have patience and goodwill when we conduct friendly negotiation with each other,” Ma said at a forum last Tuesday. She said it took other countries – including the US, Canada and Thailand – years to resolve territorial issues with neighbors.

“I think we must be patient when we talk about territorial and sovereign issues because they are so sensitive,” she said.

“But I’m very optimistic with the profound friendship between our two peoples and the development of both countries we can manage to handle the issue properly,” she said.               

The ambassador stressed that peaceful development “is a firm commitment” of China under the leadership of President Xi Jinping and Premier Li Keqiang.

“We also hope that the other countries will follow the same path for a peaceful development so that the whole world can enjoy stability and peace,” she said.

 China’s new leadership, she added, continues to attach great importance to the warm bilateral relations with the Philippines.         – With Pia Lee-Brago