The Status And Role Of Islands In Maritime Delimitation

The role and status of Islands in marine delimitationThe geopolitics plays an important role in relationship among differentcountries. While China’s geographic location where resources andgeography are so abundant and important, it is one of the throat areas forthe world economy and politics, which means that not only China itselfpursues interests in this area, but also the whole world. In the face ofthe battle of struggling national Marine rights and interests, China’space is a little bit low comparing with other countries. Most of thecountries around China of East Asia, South Asia and Southeast Asia aresurrounded by shallow sea, which makes it inevitable that the exclusiveeconomic zones will overlap. Besides, the ocean issues are transnational,conflicts and misunderstandings among countries, especially betweenneighbours are quite easy to upgrade. Therefore, China’s peripheralcondition can be summed up in three words: sovereignty, resources,strategy.Island because of its unique geographical features, in addition to thesovereignty dispute, in the practice of the maritime demarcation betweencountries often causes heated argument. Since the “United Nationsconvention on the law of the sea” which is also called “charter of theocean,” was enacted, the new sea order is set up. And islands are endowedwith the territorial sea, exclusive economic zone and the continental shelfsovereign rights, making the coastal state pay more and more attention tothe demarcation role of them. China’s legal maritime rights and interestsare faced with the constant challenge of neighboring countries as well asthe other big powers, so China must firmly maintain its own rights fromthe national level as well as the folk level.In this paper, I will start from article121of the “United Nations convention on the law of the sea”(hereinafter referred to as theconvention), to explore the establishment of the island system and therole it plays in the maritime demarcation. In addition to these, the paperwill also study from the angle of practices between or among countries,serving as a reference for our country when resolving the disputes overthe south China sea, so as to maintain the overall goal of China’s nationalsecurity and economic interests.The whole text is mainly divided into three parts. The first part isabout the theory of the island system, mainly including “the convention”,“the convention on the continental shelf”, as well as “the conventionon the territorial sea and contiguous zone” and so on. This article isfirst to analyze the provisions of island and rock system of “theconvention”, as well as the relationship between them. Also,I will tryto analyze the problems existing in the content of “the convention”. Thesecond part mainly discusses the effect on the demarcation of the islands,in combination with international maritime demarcation in practice. Thethird part is about the dispute of the south China sea, mainly about thepresent situation of the Nansha islands and the concrete problems,including “the five countries and six parties”. And I will try to analysethe demarcation of the Nansha islands according to the content of the abovetwo parts, putting forward the author’s personal opinions and solutionsuggestions,etc.