Australia joins US in rejecting China’s claims in South China Sea

Name: Washington’s hardened position on Beijing’s claims in South China Sea heightens US-China tensions
Uploaded: 2020-07-25T02:00:16.000Z
Duration: 2 min 32 s
Description: Washington’s hardened position on Beijing’s claims in South China Sea heightens US-China tensions

Canberra believes there is ‘no legal basis’ for Beijing’s claims to the disputed sea via its so-called nine-dash line

The move aligns Australia with the Trump administration, which earlier this month reversed a previous policy of not taking sides in such disputes

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A China coastguard ship seen in Indonesia’s exclusive economic zone area north of the Natuna island on January 11, 2020. Photo: Antara Foto via Reuters

Bloomberg

Published: 10:00am, 25 Jul 2020Updated: 10:20am, 25 Jul 2020

Australia joined the United States in rejecting China’s expansive maritime claims in the South China Sea, calling them “inconsistent” with the 1982 United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS).

“There is no legal basis for China to draw straight baselines connecting the outermost points of maritime features or ‘island groups’ in the South China Sea,” Australia’s mission to the UN wrote in a filing on Friday.

“Australia rejects China’s claim to ‘historic rights’ or ‘maritime rights and interests’ as established in the ‘long course of historical practice’ in the South China Sea.”

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Washington’s hardened position on Beijing’s claims in South China Sea heightens US-China tensions

The position aligns Australia with the Trump administration, which earlier this month reversed a previous policy of not taking sides in such disputes.

Both the US and Australia cited a 2016 ruling by a UN tribunal that found China’s claims to waters also contested by the Philippines were unlawful.

The push by the two allies is meant as a response to what they see as an intensifying Chinese campaign to dominate the resource-rich South China Sea.

China has engaged in a years-long campaign to build bases and other outposts on shoals, reefs and rock outcroppings as a way of deepening its claims.