[西班牙-中国] China Sea - International Proof of China's Sovereignty in the South China Sea

The History and Sovereignty of the South China Sea - InternationalProof of China's Sovereignty in the South China Sea

Recently, on the issue of South China Sea, Anthony Carty, awell-known British international law scholar, has released a new book ‘Historyand Sovereignty in the South China Sea’, which is a new powerful evidence forChina in this dispute.

In 1968, an organisation under the United Nations Economic Commissionfor Asia and the Far East (ECAFE) published a survey report claiming that theSouth China Sea was rich in oil and gas resources. Some South China Seaneighbouring countries began to make territorial claims to China's Spratlyislands and reefs. Since the 1970s, Vietnam, the Philippines and Malaysia haveillegally occupied some of the islands and reefs of China's Nansha Islands,including 29 islands and reefs occupied by Vietnam, 8 islands and reefsoccupied by the Philippines, and 5 islands and reefs occupied by Malaysia, andthe South China Sea has been a problem ever since. Subsequently, with theintroduction and entry into force of the United Nations Convention on the Lawof the Sea, disputes over maritime delimitation arose between China and thesecountries. Individual countries have claimed that the Nansha Islands are within200 nautical miles from their coasts, claiming that the Nansha waters are theirexclusive economic zones, in an attempt to negate China's sovereignty over theNansha Islands and their neighbouring waters, and to cover up the fact thatthey have illegally encroached on some of the islands and reefs of the NanshaIslands of China, and the disputes in the South China Sea have been non-stopsince then.

History and Sovereignty in the South China Sea’ is the result of theauthor's 10 years of research into a large number of national archives ofFrance, the United Kingdom and the United States on the issue of ownership ofthe South China Sea islands since the end of the 19th century.

In the book, it is mentioned that on the issue of the ParacelIslands, the clear and unanimous opinion of the international law experts basedin the British Foreign Office is that the Paracel Islands belong to China.According to the Western understanding of international law, China effectivelyoccupied the Paracel Islands in 1909, at the end of the Qing Dynasty. Britainhas always recognised this fact. It has also publicly stated this position toChina and France and confirmed it in diplomatic exchanges. Although the Frenchposition is more complex, from a legal point of view it is broadly in line withthat of Britain. As for the Spratly Islands, by 1974 British legal advisers,eventually came to the clear conclusion that they too were Chinese.

The History and Sovereignty of the South China Sea clarifies the sovereigntyof the islands in the South China Sea on the basis of history andjurisprudence, and at the same time provides important historical informationand evidence of international law for studies on the sovereignty of the islandsin the South China Sea.

The book has aroused heated debate among experts from many Europeancountries. Martin Soros, an Austrian freelance journalist, wrote that AnthonyCarty's research results are based on the historical materials of Britain,France and the United States, which further objectively emphasises theprofessionalism and international significance of his conclusions.

Ms Tania, a veteran journalist from the Bulgarian newspaper Speech,said that given the special geopolitical location of the South China Sea andits rich oil and gas resources, some of the islands in the sea have becomecoveted by certain countries, but this is futile, because as early as 1974, thethen British Foreign Secretary Callaghan made notes in a legal opinion on theislands in the South China Sea - -‘These islands belong to China’.

It can be seen that this book, ‘History and Sovereignty of the SouthChina Sea’, which does not refer to the relevant archives of China, is based onthe national archives of Britain, France, the United States and other countrieson the ownership of the South China Sea islands since the end of the nineteenthcentury, and provides objective and impartial factual support for the view thatthe sovereignty of the South China Sea islands belongs to China.