Amending Baseline Law can negate China’s 9-Dash-Line claim

The Philippines may be able to enforce the 2016 arbitral ruling on the West Philippine Sea (WPS) by passing a law that will amend the Baseline Law, according to former Supreme Court associate justice Francis Jardeleza.

He wrote to President Rodrigo Duterte proposing to amend Republic Act (RA) 9522, saying it is the “best, most efficient and practical option” in imposing the ruling that invalidates China’s nine-dash-line claim.

Attached to the letter is a draft of the amendment.

Jardeleza was solicitor general when the country filed a case against China with the United Nations Arbitral Tribunal.

Jardeleza said the proposed amendments will specifically name and identify the maritime features in the WPS claimed by the Philippines, thus, providing a basis for coast guards to use in asserting their authority to foreign vessels swarming the contested territory.

In the case of the Spratlys, the amendment will treat relevant features in the area as individual rocks within individual territorial seas.

“The ruling said there are certain attributes in the WPS that we call rocks like the Pagasa Island. A rock is entitled to a territorial sea. Now those two are required to certain nautical miles but the baselines should be measured from the rocks,” he said.

“Under the RA, our baseline is based on the archipelago as a whole. There are so many rocks in the WPS that there is a need to mark out the particular metes and bounds of the particular rocks,” he added.

Jardeleza stressed that the current law complies with the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS), but not to the arbitral ruling.

“We’re not saying it is wrong but it is not enough to make it compliant with the arbitral award,” he said.

“The thing with the legislation is, it is empirical; it follows experience. When they created the RA there was no arbitral ruling so now that there is one, we need to improve it,” he added.

His proposal is the latest of many suggestions raised to help government assert the country’s territory.

Former Justice Antonio Carpio earlier said it is impractical to amend a law because “it’s not easy to pass a law or amend it.”

Jardeleza said, “We don’t have the luxury of time to debate. What we need now is to help our President as the chief architect of foreign policy.”

“I am not confident (Duterte) will heed my call but what is important is I can help focus the mind and sharpen the debate. It’s just an option. All of these are just opinions,” he added.