Arbitral win needs assertion, global campaign to make China comply —Carpio

Retired Supreme Court Justice Antonio Carpio on Monday said the Philippines' arbitral win against China in the West Philippine Sea issue needs to be asserted and followed up by a global campaign to be enforced.

At the launch of the Call of the Sea, Carpio shared five lessons after the legal victory, which includes how to make losing state like China comply with the ruling.

“States that lost in arbitration are naturally unhappy and there are some that would like to wiggle out of their obligation to comply with the arbitral award,” he said.

“The winning state must therefore forcefully assert its award.”

The Philippines won against China in a landmark ruling on July 12, 2016 by the Permanent Court of Arbitration, which invalidated Beijing's massive claim over the resource-rich South China Sea.

Carpio said the winning state must be prepared to hold a global campaign to pressure the losing state to acknowledge the arbitral win.

He said the non-nuclear armed winning state cannot expect the nuclear armed losing state to just roll over and comply upon the issuance of the arbitral award.

“The winning state must be prepared to conduct a worldwide public relations campaign to force the losing state to comply,” Carpio said.

He added that among the few cases where a non-nuclear armed state won against a nuclear armed state, only China is the non-nuclear armed losing state that has yet to accept the ruling.

One of the lessons after the arbitral win, he said, is that states can rely on international platforms like the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) in settling maritime disputes fairly and justly.

However, Carpio also reminded that there is no world policeman who will enforce arbitral awards.

Carpio added that Filipinos should also be vocal with their support to safeguard the arbitral award.

The Call of the SEA is a new umbrella organization of multiple civil society organizations whose objective is to propagate the UNCLOS and to work with the government to enforce of the arbitral award. 

'Incomplete' victory

In the Senate, Senator Panfilo Lacson said five years after the landmark victory, the Philippines must continue pushing to complete the victory.

Lacson, who chairs the Senate Committee on National Defense and Security, Peace, Unification and Reconciliation, said much remains to be done amid China's increasing presence in the Southeast Asian region.

"Let us see this day for what it truly is: Commemorating a hard-won battle, but a victory still incomplete. We must, therefore, press on to complete the victory," he said in a statement on the fifth anniversary of the ruling.

Lacson said the Philippines has yet to come up with a comprehensive pro-Filipino policy to complete the victory we achieved five years ago today.

"Our country needs a foreign policy that is neither pro-China or pro-US. It must only be pro-Filipino. We need a foreign policy that unites us as Filipinos, not divides us into red and yellow," he said.  —KBK, GMA News