How China uses international law in South China Sea disputes, by Nguyen Thi Lan Anh

06/06/2011

How China uses international law in South China Sea disputes by Nguyen Thi Lan Anh In the process of materializing its hegemonic ambitions in the South China Sea, China has always shown concerns and wishes to use international law as the basis for their claims in the Paracel Islands and Spratly Islands as well as the claims of sovereignty, sovereign rights and jurisdiction in the waters within its U-shaped line. In fact, the Chinese has given a lot of arguments and cited the legal elements as well as historical evidence to explain the claims which appear to be logical but still arouse much ambiguity and doubt. From the legal aspects, the following article carefully analyzed the legal basis that China put forward to explain their claims of sovereignty in accordance with articles from sources of international law, especially UNCLOS, as well as carefully considered the historical evidences so as to come to the conclusions as follow: (1) statements about the legal basis and the respect for international law of China in the South China Sea’s dispute seems to merely exist in words (2), what China claims remains vague and lacks legal basis, or they simply have no legitimacy as China’s always explained. It can be referred from the article that South China Sea, or else it’s merely the application of another "international law” which is different from the common understanding of the international community. ABSTRACT