Why is Foreign Ministry Applauding South China Sea Sovereignty Violations？
By Sun Yang-ming
United Daily News, July 18, 2020
Secretary of State Mike Pompeo announced on July 13 that the United States is aligning its position with the July 2016 decision on South China Sea issued by the Permanent Court of Arbitration. Although the announcement was meant for Beijing, it nevertheless hurts Taiwan the most. But the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA), to everyone’s surprise, issued a statement welcoming the U.S. announcement.
The U.S. announcement reiterating the July 2016 judgement of the Permanent Court of Arbitration on South China Sea was a slap in the face for Taiwan. The South China Sea Arbitration’s impact on Taiwan mainly has two folds: First, the arbitral tribunal ruled that Taiping Island (Itu Aba) is a rock not an island, and second, the award ruled that the claimed “nine-dash line” and the historic rights or other sovereign rights or jurisdiction are contrary to the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) and are unlawful (in Pompeo’s terms). When the Permanent Court of Arbitration issued the award in 2016, the Office of the President made the following statement: “The arbitration on Taiping Island has seriously impaired our rights in Taiping Island and other islands in the South China Sea and their surrounding waters. We solemnly declare that we will never accept it and the arbitration judgement has no legal effect on the Republic of China whatsoever.” MOFA held the same position at the time.
The “nine-dash line” is in fact the “eleven-dash line” (or U-shaped line) announced in 1947 by the Republic of China government on the boundary of the South China Sea. Mainland China erased two dashes in 1953 and it became today’s nine-dash line. The legality or the existence of the “nine-dash line” will inevitably affect the South China Sea boundary of the R.O.C.
The eleven-dash line of our South China Sea boundary is based on historic fact. The invading Japanese troops surrendered in August 1945, the R.O.C. government dispatched navy from Hainan Island to recover the South China Sea on December 9, 1946. The entire recovery process was completed in February 1947. In August the same year the “Map of the South China Sea Islands” was published by the R.O.C. government and the U-shaped line of the South China Sea boundary was drawn clearly on the map. The R.O.C. government announced the names of each island in the South China Sea on December 1, 1947. The R.O.C. Constitution took effect on December 25 that year. Therefore, the South China Sea within the U-shaped line is undoubtedly the “inherent territory” under the Constitution.
The R.O.C. government had consulted contemporary international trend in establishing the U-shaped line. The most obvious case was the Truman Proclamation on the Continental Shelf of September 28, 1945, in which President Harry Truman of the United States issued an executive order proclaiming that the resources on the continental shelf contiguous to the United States belong to the United States. This was a radical departure from the existing approach, under which the two basic principles of the law of the sea had been a narrow strip of coastal waters under the exclusive sovereignty of the coastal state and an unregulated area beyond that known as the high seas. Soon many other countries took a similar approach. As a result, the R.O.C. government had followed the traditional concept of historic territorial waters and consulted the modern trend of international law and practices in announcing the U-shaped line of the South China Sea in December 1947.
The R.O.C. government retreated to Taiwan in 1949, yet its position on the South China Sea remains unchanged. The U-shaped line was recognized and respected by the international community for more than 20 years. The actions and claims of Southeast Asian countries on South China Sea only started in the 70s after Taiwan withdrew from the United Nations in 1971. Secretary Pompeo apparently is not aware of this history.
The UN started the discussion of UNCLOS as mentioned by Secretary Pompeo only after Taiwan was forced to withdraw from the UN. Taiwan did not participate in the discussion nor the drafting of UNCLOS. Taiwan is also not a signatory of UNCLOS. Therefore, it is clear that UNCLOS does not have legal effect on Taiwan. The U-shaped line or the eleven-dash line of the South China Sea has its historic and legal basis and should be observed and asserted by MOFA.
As a matter of fact, the United States did sign the UNCLOS, but the Senate did not ratify it. Without ratification, the U.S. is not a signatory party of the UNCLOS. How can the U.S. ask other countries to honor a treaty that she herself does not honor?
It is a shame that the Ministry of Foreign Affairs does not know how to use relevant favorable articles of the international law to protect our national interests. The recent “welcome” statement by MOFA is a direct insult to the diplomatic profession.