The unanimous decision of the Permanent Court of Arbitration in The Hague on the China-Philippines territorial dispute is final and legally binding on parties to the dispute under the provisions of the 1982 UN Convention on the Law of the Sea. Laos’ foreign ministry did not responded to Reuters’ request for comment and its state media made no mention of Thongloun’s comments to Li.
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China says if its interests in the South China Sea are threatened, it could declare an air defense identification zone in the area.
If so, how? And what might happen the next time the U.S. stages a Freedom of Navigation patrol in the South China Sea.
Mr Ruan said China was not rejecting freedom of navigation according to worldwide law.
Reiterating China’s stand that freedom of navigation in the South China Sea has never been affected, he said there won’t be a problem in future “as long as nobody plays tricks”.
China has taken part in the seizure and rebuilding of land throughout the South China Sea in recent years.
However, Chinese President Xi Jinping has said China will not be bound by the “ill-founded” and “naturally null and void” ruling, stating that their “territorial sovereignty and marine rights” came first.
China pressured countries in the Asean bloc of Southeast Asian nations not to issue a joint statement on the ruling, diplomats said.
Apart from the Philippines, Brunei, Malaysia, Taiwan and Vietnam ring the South China Sea waters, believed to hold untapped oil and gas reserves.
Separate to the meeting, the deputy chief if the Joint Staff Department of the Central Military Commission warned continued freedom of navigation operation by foreign navies in the South China Sea near Chinese holdings could be unsafe.
Mr Ruan said China recognised that Australia was a close ally of the US.
There are concerns that China may turn Scarborough Shoal into another military outpost, but so far, all signs are that Beijing wants to keep the status quo.
The Council on Foreign Relations noted in 2015 that 5.3 trillion dollars of world goods moved through the South China Sea, with 1.2 trillion of that bound for US shores.
“This kind of military freedom of navigation is damaging to freedom of navigation in the South China Sea, and it could even play out in a disastrous way”, Sun told a forum at Tsinghua University on Saturday.
China’s aggressive takeover of the shoal in 2012 was a big reason for the arbitral proceedings, which the Philippines initiated in 2013, in the first place. The tribunal ruled that China violated global maritime law by building up artificial islands that destroyed coral reefs and by disrupting fishing and oil exploration.
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Wu expressed his hope that the two countries’ air and maritime forces fully follow the Code for Unplanned Encounters at Sea and the Rules of Behavior for the Safety of Air and Maritime Encounters to avoid strategic misjudgment or exchange of fire, and to jointly ensure the peace and stability of the South China Sea.
