Philippines rejects new Chinese map showing PH features in WPS

MARITIME PATROL. Vessels believed to be manned by Chinese maritime militia are seen off the Julian Felipe Reef in the West Philippine Sea based on information from the maritime patrol conducted by the AFP Western Command on Monday (March 22, 2021). The Julian Felipe Reef is a large boomerang-shaped shallow coral reef at the northeast of Pagkakaisa Banks and Reefs (Union Reefs), located approximately 175 nautical miles west of Bataraza, Palawan. (Photo courtesy of AFP via PNA)

MANILA – The Philippine government on Thursday slammed China’s 2023 edition of its so-called “standard map” that still shows swaths of Philippine features in the West Philippine Sea.

The Chinese Ministry of Natural Resources issued on August 28 the controversial map that includes the nine-dashed line, now a 10-dashed line, that supposedly shows China’s boundaries in the South China Sea.

“This latest attempt to legitimize China’s purported sovereignty and jurisdiction over Philippine features and maritime zones has no basis under international law, particularly the 1982 United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS),” Foreign Affairs Spokesperson Ma. Teresita Daza said in a statement.

Daza said the 2016 Arbitral Award has already invalidated the nine-dashed line and called on China to abide by its obligations under UNCLOS.

“(The award) categorically stated that ‘maritime areas of the South China Sea encompassed by the relevant part of the ‘nine-dash line’ are contrary to the Convention and without lawful effect to the extent that they exceed the geographic and substantive limits of China’s maritime entitlements under the Convention,” Daza said.

“The Philippines, therefore, calls on China to act responsibly and abide by its obligations under UNCLOS and the final and binding 2016 Arbitral Award,” she added.

The Philippines is the latest nation to criticize Beijing’s publication of its more recent national map following India and Malaysia.

The said map also showed Arunachal Pradesh and the Doklam Plateau as well as the Aksai Chin that China controls but India claims.

India and China share a de facto border, parts of which are located in Arunachal Pradesh.

Manila had already protested the publication of a Chinese national map in 2013, which also placed parts of the Kalayaan Island Group or Spratlys within Beijing’s “national boundaries”.

According to a GMA News Online report that year, the Department of Foreign Affairs handed to the Chinese Embassy in Manila a June 7, 2013 note verbale, protesting China’s reference to the dash lines as part of its territory.

Daza has yet to respond to queries if the DFA lodged a new protest for the 2023 edition of the map.