The TNI-AL’s CN-235-220 maritime patrol aircraft while it was on a visit at the Singapore Airshow 2016. A similar aircraft has been deployed to the Natuna islands region for a naval drill in 2016. Source: IHS/Ridzwan Rahmat Key Points Indonesia has increased the complexity of an annual naval exercise and staging it near disputed waters […]

China says 60 countries back stance on international tribunal; Only 8 have publicly stated support BEIJING—The landlocked African kingdom of Lesotho doesn’t have an obvious stake in the South China Sea, but it is among some 60 countries that China says stand behind it as it faces potential censure by an international tribunal over its […]

Daniel R. Fung, chairman of the Hong Kong-based Asia Pacific Institute of International Law (APIIL), told Xinhua on Thursday that such an arbitration involving sovereignty issues should not be handled by PCA under the framework of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS). On June 6, 2016, the APIIL submitted an […]

China has long argued that historical documents prove the legitimacy of its claim to the South China Sea, but mainland researchers have also been looking overseas for supporting evidence. Researchers from Yunnan University and Iran’s Tehran University have studied 50 Persian maps dating from the 10th to 17th centuries and translated the script into modern […]

Two recent close encounters between US spy planes and Chinese jets spell trouble for relations between Washington and Beijing. The first, between a US EP-3 spy plane and two Chinese jets over the South China Sea (SCS) near China’s Hainan Island, was strikingly similar to the 2001 incident in the same area in which a […]

The United States has recently angered China by sending military ships and aircraft into the region including flying two B-52 bombers over the disputed islands. Stephen Conroy says the regional security challenge posed by China building artificial islands in the South China Sea needs to be directly addressed. “We believe our Defence Force should be […]

How China seeks to shape maritime law to legitimize its claims. A year and a half ago, the contested South China Sea (SCS) was awash in international intrigues and legal maneuverings. On December 7, 2014, two days after the U.S. State Department released Washington’s legal views on Beijing’s disputed nine-dash line (NDL) claim in the […]

China and the Philippines, after the arbitration decision, could settle the issues by taking account of the decision without formally mentioning it. Illustration: Craig Stephens International tensions are rising rapidly as D-Day approaches in the Philippines arbitration case against China. Increasingly anxious, Beijing is resorting to a full-court press in the propaganda realm, seeking to […]

MANILA, Philippines – Chinese pressure was blamed Thursday for a stunning diplomatic U-turn by Southeast Asian Nations that saw them retract a statement sounding alarm over Beijing’s island building in the South China Sea. The chaotic events at the end of a meeting of foreign ministers from China and the 10-member Association of Southeast Asian […]

Opinions expressed by Forbes Contributors are their own. Indonesian President Joko Widodo called a strategically important meeting with his security and political affairs minister this week over how the normally neutral Asian archipelago should handle increasing foreign pressure on its maritime claims. The minister, Luhut Binsar Panjaitan, learned from the Monday meeting that government leaders […]