Marcos says claims in SCS must conform to international law

President Ferdinand "Bongbong" Marcos Jr. on Wednesday reiterated that claims and assertions in the South China Sea should be grounded in international law. 

''The complex issues of competing claims in the South China Sea have for years, been unfortunately and simplistically reduced to the South China Sea disputes as if all claims were equal. They are not,'' Marcos said in his foreign policy address in the event hosted by Observer Research Foundation (ORF).

''The assertions of states have to pass the test of conformity with international law,'' Marcos said, pertaining to the UNCLOS and the 2016 arbitral ruling. 

Marcos said ''such misinformation and inaccurate narratives distract us from calling out illegal and unlawful actions for what they are: Violations of international law.''

Without mentioning any state, Marcos said some justify provocations under the pretext of geopolitics.

''There are those who seek to discredit international legal procedures and dismiss binding rulings to cloak open claims with resemblance of legitimacy,'' Marcos said. 

Marcos stressed that the Philippines and India should assert the clarity of international law. 

Tensions continue as China claims almost all of the South China Sea, a conduit for more than $3 trillion of annual shipborne commerce, including parts claimed by the Philippines, Vietnam, Indonesia, Malaysia, and Brunei.

The government has renamed parts of the South China Sea that fall within Philippine territory as the West Philippine Sea to reinforce the country’s claim on the resource-rich territory.

In 2016, the Permanent Court of Arbitration in the Hague ruled in favor of the Philippines over China's claims in the South China Sea, saying that it had "no legal basis."

However, China refused to recognize the ruling.

Marcos has been consistent that the Philippines would never give up a single inch of its territory to aggressors. —LDF, GMA Integrated News