MANILA, Philippines – IF China keeps snubbing the Philippines’ arbitral award, the government has no recourse but to submit the country’s maritime claims to another arbitration.
This is the conviction of former Supreme Court Associate Justice Antonio Carpio who is bent on bringing the Philippine’s claims before an international tribunal another time as settling things legally is the only way China cannot win.
“Eventually they (government) will have to (file another arbitration), wala naman tayong iba (choice). We cannot fight China in the sea, Carpio said in an ambush interview during his West Philippine Sea discussion before the members of the Rotary Club of Manila last August 8.
The Philippines, being a small archipelagic region, obviously cannot challenge the military might of the largest navy in the world. Nonetheless legally, bonafide historical documentations and the first arbitral award give the Philippines all the rightful claim to its territorial waters which anyone can challenge to a legal validation at any time.
“We can publicly invite China to submit to arbitration including Vietnam, Malaysia to submit it to arbitration if they don’t accept, we’ll tell the world, kami handa kami, these are our evidence or documents,” he said.
Claimant countries to the South China Sea as well as world superpowers have time and again condemned China’s growing aggression in the vital waterway. Despite the Philippines 2016 arbitral win against China at the Permanent Court of Arbitration at The Hague, Netherlands, Beijing still upholds its baseless now ten-dash line claim covering nearly the entire South China Sea.
And in cases where international legal jurisdictions are being neglected, the next best move, according to Carpio, is to have the entire world rally behind you.
“If there is no international court that can assume jurisdiction, you go to court of world opinion,” he said.
“We have to convince the world eh,” he said.
