Full WPS limit fielded to UN: UNCLOS entitlement beyond EEZ

Showing its determination to resist Chinese aggression on its recent sea missions, the Philippines is seeking the demarcation of its boundaries in full based on the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS).

The government has sought the UN’s recognition of its extended continental shelf (ECS) in the Western Palawan region, farther into the disputed West Philippine Sea (WPS).

The Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA), through the Philippine Mission to the UN in New York, submitted the information to the UN Commission on the Limits of the Continental Shelf (CLCS) on 14 June (New York time).

The UN submission is expected to further incense China which maintains that it has historical entitlement over the WPS through its debunked nine-dash line boundaries.

DFA Assistant Secretary for Maritime and Ocean Affairs Marshall Louis Alferez said the submission contains a declaration not only of the maritime entitlements under UNCLOS but also Manila’s commitment to the responsible application of its processes.

Alferez said the country’s move is a rejection of China’s vast claim over the WPS and would help secure the sovereign rights and maritime jurisdictions.

This is the second time the Philippines has registered an ECS entitlement.

In 2012, the CLCS validated its partial submission on the Philippine (Benham) Rise, resulting in an additional 135,506 square kilometers of seabed area ceded to the country.

Alferez noted that the 2016 arbitral ruling confirmed the maritime entitlements and rejected those that exceeded geographic and substantive limits under UNCLOS.

“Incidents in the waters tend to overshadow the importance of what lies beneath,” he said.

Maximum boundary

The DFA official pointed out that the seabed and the subsoil extending from the archipelago up to the maximum extent allowed by UNCLOS “hold significant potential resources” that will benefit the country and the generations of Filipinos to come.

“Today, we secure our future by making a manifestation of our exclusive right to explore and exploit the natural resources in our extended continental shelf (ECS) entitlement,” he said.

Alferez, however, clarified that the Philippines’ submission does not prejudice discussions with other coastal states that may have legitimate ECS claims measured from their respective lawful baselines under UNCLOS.

“We consider our submission as our step in discussion delimitation matters and other forms of cooperation moving forward. What is important is that the Philippines puts on the record the maximum extent of our entitlement,” he said.

Ambassador Antonio Lagdameo, the Philippine permanent representative to the UN in New York, said the submission can reinvigorate the efforts of states to demonstrate their readiness to pursue UNCLOS processes in the determination of maritime entitlements and promote a rules-based international order.

The National Mapping and Resource Information Agency (NAMRIA) led the ECS technical working group (ECS-TWG) that worked on the submission for more than a decade and a half.

Backed by strong data

NAMRIA Administrator Peter Tiangco welcomed the ECS submission and thanked the ECS-TWG for their work in gathering and processing data on geodetic and hydrographic information, and geophysical and geological information to substantiate the submission.

The Philippines, in its first submission for Benham Rise in 2009, stated that it reserved the right to make submissions for other areas in the future.

Under Article 76 of UNCLOS, a coastal state such as the Philippines is entitled to establish the outer limits of its continental shelf comprising the seabed and subsoil of the submarine areas extending beyond 200 nautical miles but not to exceed 350 NM from the baselines from which the breadth of the territorial sea is measured.

The first submission was also undertaken by the ECS-TWG, an inter-agency body composed of technical, legal, diplomatic, political, and law enforcement experts from several Philippine offices and agencies, among them, NAMRIA, DFA, the Department of Justice, Department of Energy, National Security Council, Department of Environment and Natural Resources–Mines and Geosciences Bureau, University of the Philippines Institute for Maritime Affairs and Law of the Sea, the UP National Institute of Geological Sciences, the former National Coast Watch Council Secretariat, Department of National Defense, Office of the Solicitor General and Philippine Coast Guard.