The 2016 SCS Arbitral ruling was and is a continuing unmitigated disaster for the Philippines’ territorial sovereignty, that we see manifesting in the following:

1. The treaty limits that are historic titles we inherited from the US through the 1898 Treaty of Paris;
2. Our claim of the Kalayaan Island Group (KIG) as part of Philippine territory by virtue of Presidential Decree 1596.

In the first, the Philippines stand to lose 830,140 sq. kilometers of sovereign territory in order to gain a pyrrhic Exclusive Economic Zone beyond our western borders, that will remain disputed by four other counterparties in perpetuity, unless dialogue and negotiations are conducted among all.

In the second case, where the Arbitral ruling confirmed in its Paragraph 574, that the Philippines’ Kalayaan Island Group claim does not meet the criteria for an archipelago under the UNCLOS as claimed in its entirety, the Philippines stands to lose the KIG polygonal territory of another 70,000 square kilometers.

Earlier in 2009, we conceded the case by reducing KIG to a fractured “regime of islands” under Republic Act 9522, but only with territorial waters for features with the high-tide elevations. (see attached map). We lost our claims for the remaining features that are low-tide elevations, as LTEs are not subject to sovereignty claims.

This is the sad consequence of the Filipino legalese mindset conforming our Republic 9522 “baselines law” to only one treaty, the United Nations Convention on the Laws of the Seas, and ignoring a great flexibility provided by diplomacy using the entirety of the international and customary laws.

The Philippines hard-balled further, by incorporating RA9522 and codifying UNCLOS and the 2016 Arbitral Award, and including a fictitious “West Philippine Sea” into our Maritime Zones Act, championed by losing senator Francis Tolentino and signed by President Marcos Jr. on November 2024.

Arbitral Tribunal case proponents have argued: “China will comply.” But we seem to be going the opposite direction. Nine years have passed and China has fortified its assertion of sovereignty and actual control of the SCS areas disputed with the Philippines, in many cases effectively pushing out Philippine challenges to its sovereign authority, in and around the disputed areas.

The 2016 Arbitral award has been a key “lawfare” and cognitive warfare strategy of the U.S. “Pivot to Asia” with its Filipino proxies, used to drive a wedge between China and the Philippines and create the “China bully” narrative to alienate China, isolate the Philippines from the ASEAN cooperation with China and violate ASEAN’s ZOPFAN and SEANFZT.*

The Philippines has drawn subtle but telling admonitions from ASEAN luminaries such as ex-Singapore PM Lee Hsien Loong asking if the Philippines wants to be a “battleground” between the U.S. and China, and PM Anwar Ibrahim has said while in Manila in 2023 “US … military presence … should be avoided because then would then provoke and escalate tension.

The Arbitral Award is a key component of the “Atin Ito” myth used by US Filipino proxies to subvert and sabotage the effort to reach a “win-win” solution proposed since Premier Deng Xiaoping’s meet with President Cory Aquino and almost realized by President Duterte by his “60-40 oil and gas joint venture” with President Xi Jinping in 2017.

Alienating the Philippines from China caused the loss of $23-billion investments from China signed in January 2023. This was followed by systematic dismantling of in-pipeline projects such as the multi-billion Dollars projects Luzon South Rail, Mindanao Circumferential rail, Subic-Clark rail projects, among many other priority projects bereft of funding now.

Quotas have also been imposed on incoming visitors from China, dropping tourism inflows from the 1.9 million level already attained in 2019 to less than 400,000 last year, putting us even behind Cambodia.

The Philippines lost its national unity, peace and prosperity, as the U.S. and its Filipino proxies use the fairytale of the Arbitration Award to witch hunt and “China-tag” advocates of independent foreign policy and neutrality in international relations, in order to advance America’s next proxy war and arms sales in the Philippines.

The Bongbong Marcos “pivot to the US” must be reversed and the primacy of the Philippine Constitution’s “independent foreign policy” as well as Article 18, Section 25 banning “foreign bases, troops, and facilities” be restored.

The 20th Senate with its new majority of independent-minded, patriotic and foreign relations neutralist senators constitute a new hope for the Philippines to restore its sovereignty, independence, to put the Arbitration Award in its proper perspective. ###

 

Email: contact@asiancenturyph.com

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/asiancenturyph/

Twitter: https://twitter.com/AsianCenturyPH

Substack:

Also read: