Maritime security is of vital importance to the South China Sea, a critical sea route for maritime transport of East Asian countries including China. The adjacent countries have rendered overlapping territorial and/or maritime claims in the South China Sea which complicate the situation of maintaining maritime security and developing regional cooperation there. This book focuses on contemporary maritime security in the South China Sea as well as its connected sea area, the Straits of Malacca and Singapore. It identifies and examines selected security issues concerning the safety of navigation, crackdown on transnational crimes including sea piracy and maritime terrorism, and conflict prevention and resolution. In the context of non-traditional security, issues such as maritime environmental security and search and rescue at sea are included. The book explores ways and means of international cooperation in dealing with these maritime security issues.

Major law and policy issues in the South China Sea are discussed mainly from the perspectives of leading American and European scholars in the study of the complex South China Sea disputes. The issues include regional maritime cooperation and regime building, Southeast Asian countries’ responses to the Chinese assertiveness, China’s historic claims, maritime boundary delimitation and excessive maritime claims, military activities and the law of the sea, freedom of navigation and its impact on the problem, the dispute between Vietnam and China, confidence-building measures and U.S.-Taiwan-China relations in the South China Sea, and Taiwan’s role in the resolution to the South China Sea issues. Over the past three years, there have been several incidents in the South China Sea between the claimants, and also between the claimants and non-claimants over fisheries, collection of seismic data, exploration for oil and gas resources, and exercise of freedom of navigation. Third party concerns and involvement in the South China Sea disputes have been increasing as manifested in actions taken by the United States, India, and Japan. It is therefore important to examine South China Sea disputes from the legal and political perspective and from the view point of American and European experts who have been studying South China Sea issues for many years.

Satellite imagery and geospatial analysis tools offer an unprecedented opportunity to harness new technologies in order to help resolve boundary disputes. The South China Sea in Focus: Clarifying the Limits of Maritime Dispute uses these tools to provide a first and necessary step toward tackling the overlapping maritime disputes in the South China Sea: determining which waters are and are not in dispute under international law. The report opens with a set of geographic information system (GIS)–based maps that provide an easily understandable benchmark against which policymakers and academics can judge the claims and actions of the South China Sea claimants. More detailed color maps and methodological information follow for those who want to dig deeper into the claims and the report’s conclusions.

This book project evaluates the applicability and effectiveness of UNCLOS as a settlement mechanism for addressing ocean disputes. Focus is placed on the South China Sea (SCS) dispute, one of the most complex and challenging ocean-related conflicts in the world. The book considers the internal coherence of the Law of the Sea Convention regime and its dispute settlement procedures. It looks at the participation in the UNCLOS negotiation, maritime legislation, and dispute settlement practice of relevant States party to the dispute. The book goes on to explore the relationship between UNCLOS and other regimes and institutions in general in the SCS, particularly in regard to maritime security, marine environment protection, oil and gas joint development and political interaction.

The South China Sea is a major strategic waterway for trade and oil shipments to Japan, Korea as well as southern China. It has been the focus of a maritime dispute which has continued now for over six decades, with competing claims from China, Vietnam, the Philippines, Indonesia and Brunei. Recently China has become more assertive in pressing its claims – harassing Vietnamese fishing vessels and seizing reefs in the Philippine claim zone. China has insisted that it has "indisputable sovereignty" over the area and has threatened to enforce its claim. All of this is unsettling and draws in the United States which is concerned about freedom of navigation in the area. The US has been supporting the Philippines and has been developing security ties with Vietnam as a check upon China. This book examines the conflict potential of the current dispute, it discusses how the main claimants and the United States view the issue, and assesses the prospects for a resolution of the problem.

This edited volume examines the political and security issues influencing and shaping the developing maritime order in the Indo Pacific. If focuses specifically on the impact of China’s maritime expansion upon the policies and strategies of the regional states as well as the major players. The chapters examine the interaction of these players, paying particular attention to Japan, as the originator of the Indo Pacific idea and promoter of security cooperation and regionalism. It also covers the responses of the ASEAN claimants, Vietnam, Malaysia, the Philippines as well as Indonesia, alongside the key players, India, the US and also the EU.