Xinhua carries the reaction of China’s Foreign Ministry, which says “the award is null and void and has no binding force”.
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China has boycotted the case, arguing that the tribunal has no jurisdiction and saying it won’t accept the ruling.
In a press release issued by the arbitral tribunal, the five-member panel ruled in favor of the Philippines in its case against China in what has been described as a “historic case”.
Although China maintains a majority of the control within the “nine-dash line”, the Permanent Court of Arbitration determined the boundary violates the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea – which China and the Philippines both signed. Beijing claimed the global court had no jurisdiction to rule on the matter.
China claims the waters within its “nine-dash line” – that extends hundreds of miles to the south and east of its island province of Hainan. Also, China has exclusive economic zone and continental shelf, based on Nanhai Zhudao, according to the statement.
Earlier, US State Department spokesman John Kirby termed the court’s decision “an important contribution to the shared goal of a peaceful resolution to disputes in the South China Sea”. China called the case a “farce” and refused to participate in the court hearings.
Tribunal members also ruled that numerous islands in the Spratly chain could not be technically deemed islands, since the court ruled numerous land masses cannot sustain a “human community or independent economic life”, according to the ruling.
It also said Beijing was violating the Philippines’ sovereign rights by constructing artificial islands there.
Having found that none of the features claimed by China was capable of generating an EEZ the PCA concluded that it could-without delimiting a boundary-declare that certain sea areas are within the EEZ of the Philippines, because those areas are not overlapped by any possible entitlement of China. Here’s a summary of the key rulings by the court. Neighbours Brunei, Malaysia, the Philippines, Taiwan and Vietnam also have claims. China has laid claim to almost all of the South China Sea and this year deployed surface-to-air missiles on a disputed island in the Paracel chain. They called their campaign to push China out of the South China Sea, “CHexit” or “China exit now”.
The dispute has become the centre of a tense stand-off between China and the United States, with Washington claiming that China’s increasingly aggressive behaviour in the region threatens free passage through the area’s critically important shipping lanes. Both the Philippines and China have claimed sovereignty over the triangle of reef and rocks, and China has occupied it since 2012.
Vietnam, meanwhile, accused Chinese vessels of sinking a Vietnamese fishing boat in disputed waters.
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Beijing has held naval drills between the Paracels and the southern Chinese island of Hainan in recent days.
