The South China Sea Arbitration Decision: The Need for Clarification

On July 12, 2016, a five-person panel of the Permanent Court of Arbitration in the Hague, constituted as an Arbitral Tribunalunder Annex VII of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (1982) (UNCLOS), handed down a judgment that is surely the most important set of jurisprudential rulings in the modern history of the international law of the sea. In a case brought in 2013 by the Philippines against China to contest Chinese claims and actions in the South China Sea, the Tribunal ruled in favor of the Philippines on virtually every issue of the dispute. The Tribunal also clarified many murky issues and problems inherent in provisions of the UNCLOS. The judg-ment, therefore, is a landmark ruling that is significant not only for the South China Sea, but also for contested maritime rights and responsibilities in other maritime areas of the world.