On September 11, 2012, the government of Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda nationalized three islands in the Senkaku/Diaoyu chain, which are claimed by China and Taiwan. Uotsuri-shimai is one of the three islands. The other two are Minamiko-jima and Kita-ko-shima.
West Reef, also known as West London Reef, has undergone 65,000 square meters of land reclamation since mid-2012. Vietnam had already built several small military structures across the reef and recent construction activity has included a number of buildings that could have future military use.
On June 21, 2012 the State Council promoted Sansha City on Woody (Yongxing) Island from a county to a prefectural level administrative entity, the second highest administrative division. Sansha continued its responsibility for managing the Paracels, the Spratlys (claimed by China as the Nansha Islands), the Zhongsha Islands (a collection of features that includes the Macclesfield Bank) and their surrounding waters.
Alison Szalwinski is Vice President of Research at NBR. Ms. Szalwinski provides executive leadership to NBR’s policy research agenda and oversees research teams in Seattle and Washington, D.C. She is the author of numerous articles and reports and co-editor of the Strategic Asia series along with Ashley J. Tellis and Michael Wills, including the most recent volumes, Strategic Asia 2020: U.S.-China Competition for Global Influence (2020), Strategic Asia 2019: China’s Expanding Strategic Ambitions (2019), and Strategic Asia 2017–18: Power, Ideas, and Military Strategy in the Asia-Pacific (2017). Prior to joining NBR, Szalwinski spent time at the U.S. Department of State and the Center for Strategic and International Studies.… Read More »Alison Szalwinski
The East China Sea has been described by some experts as a potential “flashpoint” of interstate conflict and great-power rivalry and a source of regional destabilization.[1] Much attention has focused on military activities in this maritime theater, primarily involving Japan, China, and South Korea. In contrast, this essay focuses on the complex maritime and sovereignty claims of Northeast Asian states in the East China Sea and unpacks the differing legal principles they use to support their claims in order to understand the enduring nature of the conflicts. These disputes are challenging precisely because they involve contests over both territorial sovereignty… Read More »Maritime and Sovereignty Disputes in the East China Sea
The Maritime Police Law was passed on January 22, 2021, by the National People’s Congress of the People’s Republic of China (PRC). The law, which went into effect on February 1, 2021, authorizes the China Coast Guard to use force against foreign vessels to assert the PRC’s claims in South China Sea. These short expert commentaries assess the law from different regional perspectives. March 4, 2021 Ting-Hui Lin, the Deputy Secretary General of the Taiwanese Society of International Law, provides the following statement: China’s new Maritime Police Law, which entered into force on February 1, allows the China Coast Guard to… Read More »Voices: The Chinese Maritime Police Law
Olivia Truesdale is an intern with the Political and Security Affairs group at NBR. She supports project activities such as research, drafting, proofreading, and fact checking. Prior to joining NBR, Ms. Truesdale was a Nonimmigrant Visa Unit intern at the U.S. Embassy, Seoul, and an exchange student at Yonsei University. She is a senior and studies foreign languages and cultures, specializing in Korean and Spanish, at Scripps College in Claremont, California.
The Australia-India-Indonesia (AII) trilateral is an example of how the power structure in Asia has become multipolar. Conceived formally in Bogor in 2017, the AII has gradually progressed through senior-level meetings held in Canberra in 2018 and New Delhi in 2019. The grouping adds to the existing trilaterals in the region, such as the Japan-U.S.-India, Australia-India-Japan, and recent Australia-France-India groupings. The AII also complements the Quad (comprising Australia, India, Japan, and the United States), which has become a pragmatic mode of multilateral cooperation in the Indo-Pacific. Considering the myriad such groupings in the region, this essay examines what value the… Read More »The Australia-India-Indonesia Trilateral: Fostering Maritime Cooperation between Middle Powers
The Indo-Pacific region is facing a host of daunting maritime challenges, including increasingly frequent and extreme weather events due to climate change, ocean pollution, pressure on fishing stocks, and threats to maritime commerce, among many others. The Republic of Korea (ROK) has an important stake in mitigating these concerns. Yet, none of these problems can be solved by any single government; instead, they require cooperation among like-minded states to achieve solutions. One way in which South Korea can contribute is through participation with the Quad coalition of Australia, India, Japan, and the United States, possibly through creation of a maritime… Read More »South Korea, the Quad, and Maritime Security
The Declaration on the Conduct of Parties in the South China Sea, signed by China and the members of ASEAN in Phnom Penh in 2002, reaffirms freedom of navigation and overflight, peaceful settlement of disputes, and self-restraint in the conduct of activities.