By Tran Đinh Hoanh Tran Đinh Hoanh is an international litigator and writer in Washington DC.
[TĐH: I’ve tried to make this piece ultra-short, simple, and easy
to remember, with sufficient citations for those who’d like to dig
deeper into UNCLOS]
During China Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Wang Wenbin’s Regular Press Conference on June 13, he responded to a Bloomberg question concerning the legal status of the Taiwan Strait. Asked about Chinese military officials’ contention that the Taiwan Strait does not constitute “international waters,” he said that Taiwan is “an inalienable part of China’s territory. …According to UNCLOS and Chinese laws, the waters of the Taiwan Strait, extending from both shores toward the middle of the Strait, are divided into several zones including internal waters, territorial sea, contiguous zone, and the Exclusive Economic Zone. China has sovereignty, sovereign rights and jurisdiction over the Taiwan Strait.”
He went on to say that calling the strait international waters is “a false claim” by “certain countries” searching for a pretext for “threatening China’s sovereignty and security.”
Captain Raul (Pete) Pedrozo, U.S. Navy (Ret.), is the Howard S. Levie Chair on the Law of Armed Conflict and Professor of International Law in the Stockton Center for International Law at the U.S. Naval War College. He was a Peer Reviewer for the International Committee of the Red Cross Commentary of 2017 on the Convention (II) for the Amelioration of the Condition of Wounded, Sick and Shipwrecked Members Of the Armed Forces at Sea (1949) and is currently one of two U.S. representative to the International Group of Experts for the San Remo Manual on the Law Applicable to Armed Conflicts at Sea, produced by the International Institute of Humanitarian Law. Prior to his retirement from the Navy he served as the senior legal advisor to Commander, U.S. Pacific Command and was a Special Assistant to the Under Secretary of Defense for Policy, Office of the Secretary of Defense. Pedrozo is co-author of the forthcoming, “Emerging Technology and the Law of the Sea” (Oxford University Press).
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On Sept. 18 and 19, People’s Liberation Army combat aircraft on 40 occasions intentionally crossed the median line in the Taiwan Strait that separates mainland China from the island of Taiwan. Taiwan President Tsai Ing-wen immediately condemned the provocation as a “threat of force.”
The center line in the Taiwan Strait (also known as the median line, middle line or Davis Line, named after Brig. Gen. Benjamin Davis, commander of Task Force 13 in Taipei and famed commander of the World War II Tuskegee Airmen) has its origins in the 1954 U.S.-Taiwan Mutual Defense Treaty. The treaty was one link in the chain of U.S. collective defense arrangements in the Western Pacific—which included agreements with the Republic of the Philippines, Australia, New Zealand, Japan and the Republic of Korea—designed to resist further communist subversive activities directed against their territorial integrity and political stability. Pursuant to Article V of the Mutual Defense Treaty, an armed attack in the treaty area, which included Taiwan and the Pescadores (or Penghu) Islands, directed against the territory of either party would be considered a danger “to its own peace and safety” and each party “would act to meet the common danger in accordance with its constitutional processes.” An addendum to the treaty established a buffer zone into which U.S. aircraft were not allowed to enter.
Chinese military officials in recent months have repeatedly asserted that the Taiwan Strait isn’t international waters during meetings with US counterparts, according to a person familiar with the situation, generating concern within the Biden administration.
The statement disputing the US view of international law has been delivered to the American government by Chinese officials on multiple occasions and at multiple levels, the person said. The US and key allies say much of the strait constitutes international waters, and they routinely send naval vessels through the waterway as part of freedom of navigation exercises.
CVD 