South China Sea

Since The Permanent Court of Arbitration issued its award on 12 July 2016 it have raised many controvertion. Almost all Submissions are decided in favour of the Philippines. The Award, as expected by many scholars, is not intended to solve the core dispute of the South China Sea ‘what maritime features belong to whom’, since the very nature of this kind of dispute is not under the Tribunal competence. The sovereignty over disputed features shall be left to the claimant States for the resolution. Nevertheless, the Tribunal Award has not only clarified the dispute but also partially solve the core dispute. The legal clarification is expected to contribute to future negotiations among the claimant States concerning the core (sovereignty) dispute. This Article attempts to identify and describe what has been changed by the Tribunal Rulings and what has been solved. The implication of the Ruling on Indonesia’s legal interest is also briefly discuss.

However, that policy has severely affected Jakarta – Beijing diplomatic relations. Although Indonesia has scuttled 234 foreign vessels, Chinese vessels have enjoyed a special approach compared to other offenders. )n December , a large ship filled with Chinese crews was arrested by custom officers in Merauke and Papua, far from the South China Sea. When the Minister of Marine Affairs and Fisheries, Susi Pudjiastuti, decided that the vessel should be scuttled as an effort to enforce sanctions, her ministerial colleagues argued not to sink the vessel to avoid problems with China. Although the vessel was finally scuttled in May 2015, without any media coverage, this action was postponed until six months after the fishermen were captured. Indonesia has, meanwhile, had to manage its own tensions with Beijing regarding its behaviour in the South China Sea in the waters off Natuna (Connelly, 2015).

Indonesia will increase its defense budget to IDR200 trillion (USD15 billion) by 2020 as it becomes a commitment to reduce its part dependency on sourc- ing military procurement funds from foreign military aid (Grevatt, 2015). In 2014 the Indonesian Minister of Defence Purnomo Yusgiantoro said that the govern- ment was planning to build a combat helicopter base on Natuna Island to strengthen Indonesia’s military power in the territory that borders the South China Sea (Tempo, 2014). It displays Indonesia’s willingness to increase their self-defence strategy amidst uncer- tainty in international affairs more importantly in the South China Sea dispute. In addition, one of the most important points of the GMN concept concern- ing the South China Sea dispute is stated by The Indonesian Minister for Foreign Affairs, Retno Marsudi, who signalled the intention of Indonesia to make more of a contribution through a bilaterally driven and self-interested approach to diplomacy. It will be applied through continual pressure on the completion of the code of conduct in South China Sea between China and ASEAN (Kemlu, 2015). This vision can be considered as Indonesia’s strategy to play a more active role in regional basis, while pursuing national interests at the same time. As ASEAN leaders, Indonesia is a strategic place for any sort of international commerce. In order to apply this policy, there have to be coordinating policies from ministries to articulate the grand design of GMN, for instance the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Ministry of Defence, Ministry of Maritime Affairs and Fisheries, Ministry of Transportation, and the Indonesian Navy. Neverthe- less, 9 months since inauguration, none of the minis- tries involved in that vision have released any official blueprint in regard to GMN implementation. In order to respond to the challenges, four broad tiers of decision-making are particularly important: policy making at the level of grand strategy, grand strategy making, military policy and strategy making, naval policy and strategy making (Till, 2015).

United Nations Conventions on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) is thus expected to become a legal guideline for all claimants to comply with the peaceful dispute settlement. It is stated that every state has the right to establish the breadth of its territorial sea up to a limit of 12 nautical miles, measured from baselines determined in accordance with this convention (UNCLOS, 1982). However, China has made new claim over the ‘’nine-dashed line” which embraces some 80% of the South China Sea is described as China’s historic waters. This claim has raised the awareness of its neighbors such as the Philippines and Vietnam as they believe that they too are entitled to benefit from the natural resources and other potentials of the region. Sovereignty claims and energy vulnerabil- ity become the two major factors which exacerbate the dispute. As a sea which holds a huge amount of potential energy resources, it becomes potentially one of the most protracted conflict zones in Asia Pacific, where both regional and international players try to assert their unequivocal primacy over the disputed area. There are at least six countries with interests at stake in the competing territorial and jurisdictional claims of the South China Sea; China, Taiwan, Vietnam, Malaysia, Brunei, and the Philippines. Among all claimants, China persistently displays the most aggressive behaviour proven by the military build-up and public statement by Chinese officials in regard to their reluctance to engage with external parties in the dispute such as the U.S. On the other hand, the U.S. argued that they have underwritten regional security for decades, patrolling Asia’s sea lanes and preserving stability, therefore their presence in playing a more contributing role in the region is needed (Clinton, 2015). Notwithstanding the fact that

As the tension in South China Sea has risen, pundits and scholars quickly forgot how manageable it was once during the period after the Asian Financial Crisis until before the Global Economic Crisis of 2008. This paper will identify and elaborate the reasonof South China Sea tension to re-escalate after a decade of sustained peace while trying to assess the effectiveness of ASEAN Way in defusing the conflict and understand the role of Indonesia in South China Sea territorial dispute. The findings of this study explained what motivates China to take tougher stance in this matter. First is the internationaliza- tion of South China Sea dispute with the submission through International Court of Jus- tice by Malaysia and Vietnam; second is the growing international power and influence China gained after the global economic crisis of 2008; third, while China’s growing naval capabilities since a decade ago has made possible for China to extend its power projec- tion far reaching its coastline; fourth the growing interdependence of regional trade from Southeast Asian countries with China through the full establishment of China-ASEAN Free Trade Area in 2010; fifth, ineffectiveness of the U.S. rebalancing strategy in Asia due to its stance on South China Sea, and sixth, disunity of ASEAN to converge on a common course of action towards China’s behavior in South China Sea, this evidence also concurs how ineffectiveness of ASEAN Way to come to agreement what are the Code of Conduct should look like. Meanwhile Indonesia tried hard to push this agenda in various formal and informal meetings in East Asia, although the noise its making still cannot lured parties involved reluctantly revert back to the old balancing power game. Keywords: South China Sea, ASEAN Way, Indonesia

This study is a quantitative content analysis. Ker- linger (1973) defines it as a systematic, objective and quantitative process for the purpose of variable of measurement. In this study, the author wants to find out propaganda techniques performed by the mass media in Indonesia (Harian Kompas) and China (Xinhua News Agency). The population in this study is the entire news relevant to the South China Sea, including the problem of illegal fishing in Natuna Is- lands published in Harian Kompas and Xinhua News Agency in a two-month period from May 30 until July 30, 2016. This period is chosen because there was an illegal fishing carried out by Chinese boats at the end of May. The keywords used are “the South China Sea” and “Indonesia.” This study uses a total sam- pling, namely the entire population of the news from May 30 to July 30, 2016. There are 66 news articles from Harian Kompas and another 10 from Xinhua News Agency.

15. Dengan berulang kali menegaskan kembali bahwa negosiasi atau berunding sebagai sarana untuk menyelesaikan perselisihan, dan dengan menekankan bahwa negosiasi akan dilakukan oleh negara yang bersangkutan secara langsung, ketentuan yang dikutip di atas instrumen bilateral dan ayat 4 dari DOC jelas telah menimbulkan akibat tidak termasuknya setiap penyelesaian menggunakan pihak ketiga. Secara khusus, yang disebutkan di Joint Statement between the People's Republic of China and the Republic of the Philippines concerning Consultations on the South China Sea and on Other Areas of Cooperation of 10 August 1995 menetapkan di butir 3 bahwa "proses bertahap dan kerjasama harus diadopsi dengan tujuan akhir yaitu negosiasi sebagai penyelesaian sengketa bilateral ". Istilah "akhir" dalam konteks ini jelas berfungsi untuk menekankan bahwa "perundingan" adalah satu-satunya cara yang dipilih untuk penyelesaian sengketa, dengan mengesampingkan cara lain termasuk prosedur penyelesaian pihak ketiga;

Melihat dinamika konflik yang terjadi di Laut China Selatan seperti yang ditunjukkan di atas maka tantangan Pemerintah Indonesia saat ini adalah bagaimana memainkan Perannya melalui pengelolaan konflik. Saat ini sebetulnya Pemerintahan Joko Widodo telah menunjukkan komitmennya untuk melakukan hal tersebut yakni melalu diplomasi membumi. Diplomasi membumi ini adalah diplomasi yang berorientasi pada kepentingan rakyat dan lebih berorientasi ke dalam negeri. Hal ini tentu saja berbeda dengan gaya kepemimpinan presiden terdahulu yaitu Soesilo Bambang Yudhoyono (SBY), dimana diplomasi yang digunakan pada saat itu dikenal dengan istilah “thousand friends zero enemy”. Oleh karena itu, menurut Prof. Dewi Fortuna Anwar untuk memainkan peran strategisnya, Pemerintah Indonesia sebagai negara terbesar di ASEAN sekaligus negara dengan penduduk terbesar keempat di dunia tidak cukup hanya menggunakan diplomasi membumi saja melainkan perlu ditambah dengan visioner, kapasitas intelektual, pemimpin yang

The Indonesian Through Flow (ITF) is the connection between two oceanic basins in the tropical region, Pacific Ocean and Indian Ocean. There are three Indonesian Through Flow (ITF) branches: the flow through the Makassar Strait; through the South China Sea; and through the eastern Indonesian basins (Du & Qu, 2010). In the South China Sea, the water exchanged between the Pacific Ocean and South China Sea within the depth range of the thermocline, later observations revealed that there is a Kuroshio branch toward the South China Sea both winter and summer and the intrusion of the North Pacific Tropical Water seems to occur during most. The South China Sea connects in the south with the Sulu and Java Seas through the Shallow Mindoro (-200 m) and Karimata (50m) straits dan in the north with East China Sea through the shallow Taiwan Strait (<100m) and with the Pacific Ocean through the deep Luzon Strait (>2000m) (Qu et al., 2009).

70 In the vital needs of Japan to maintain its “Economic Well-being”, South China Sea serve as the main route of Japan’s energy imports from the Middle East and other country, which needs to pass South China Sea in order to reach Japan in the Eastern part of Asia. The abundant natural resource and potential hydrocarbon deposits in the area of South China Sea also become one of the consideration why Japan needs to involve in securing the South China Sea Region. Many of Japan’s off-shore and on-shore oil production assets were located in the claimed area of China’s 9-dashed line, thus China’s assertiveness in South China Sea poses a significant threat towards Japan’s economy. By supporting the countries that have been currently participating in the disputes with China, especially Philippines, Japan is actually securing is economy in indirect way and also maintaining the already established economic cooperation between Japan and the Southeast Asia Countries.

Another reason is regional maritime conflicts in South China Sea, particularly conflicts in Spratly and Paracel Islands that involve China, Vietnam, Brunei, Malaysia, the Philippines and Taiwan. xxiv Regarding the involvement of China in this conflict, Southeast Asian countries see there is a possibility that China will use its forces to solve the dispute because China has been active and engaged its military force in the conflict area. Additionally, tensions have frequently happened between China and others countries that also claim Spratly Islands as part of their territory. xxv In 1998 former the Philippines Defense Secretary Orlando S. Mercado described the Chinese occupation and enlargement some structures in the Mischief Reef, Spratly Island as a strong indication of China’s “creeping invasion” of the “disputed South China Sea chain. xxvi Consequently, these all situations highlight Southeast Asian countries to give more attention over PLA’s modernization and see it as a potential threat for security in Southeast Asia.