Fishing rules row may push China to clarify its South China Sea claims
Mark Valencia says Beijing must navigate safe course amid foreign protests and domestic pressure
The ambiguity of China's claims in the South China Sea has long been the main obstacle to resolving or even managing the jurisdictional disputes there. Despite of repeated requests from rival claimants, as well as the US, China has declined to clarify exactly what it claims and why.
Its infamous nine-dash line encompassing most of the South China Sea is open to several interpretations.
Persistent questioners may want to be careful what they wish for; they may not like the answer. Indeed, the recent "revision" of Hainan's fisheries regulations, which became effective on January 1, may have brought us closer to a clarification of China's claims.
China is now facing a political dilemma of its own making … This seems a no-win situation
The Philippines, Vietnam, the US, Japan and even Taiwan have protested. Some analysts say the revised rules violate the 2002 Asean-China Declaration on the Conduct of Parties in the South China Sea and undermine the advances made by President Xi Jinping and Premier Li Kaqiang during their "goodwill" visits to Southeast Asia last year.
However, according to Taylor Fravel of MIT, these rules are not new but simply Hainan's implementation of China's 2004 fisheries law, and similar rules issued in 1993 and 1998.
The concerns focus on one article in the Hainan People's Congress reaffirmation of these laws, which states that "foreigners or foreign fishing ships entering sea areas administered by Hainan and engaged in fishery production or fishery resource surveys should receive approval from relevant departments of the State Council".
The problem is that the previous versions of the law specified Hainan's jurisdiction as including much of the South China Sea which is also claimed in part by Brunei, Malaysia, the Philippines, Vietnam and Taiwan. Xinhua reported that these rules apply to 2 million square kilometres in the South China Sea.
Moreover, existing Chinese law stipulates that a foreign fishing vessel that enters these waters without permission will be expelled and have its catch confiscated, and be fined up to 500,000 yuan (HK$636,000).