Guidelines prove that ASEAN, China can deliver results: Marty

The Jakarta Post,
Nusa Dua, Bali
Thu, 07/21/2011

ASEAN and China’s agreement on guidelines in the South China Sea dispute should convince the world that both sides can avoid conflict and resolve competing claims peacefully, Foreign Minister Marty Natalegawa says.

ASEAN’s first declaration on the South China Sea was issued in 1992. However it was not until ASEAN and Chinese officials met in Cambodia a decade later that an agreement was reached on the need for guidance on implementing the declaration on the conduct (DOC) of the parties in the South China Sea.

After nine years of on-and-off talks, ASEAN and Chinese officials agreed on guidelines to implement the DOC in Bali on Wednesday.

The guidelines are sure not to please everyone. There are significant omissions, such as the absence rules of engagement governing how naval ships from claimant countries should behave in disputed territories.

Lacunae aside, Marty said that the guidelines were a milestone achievement for the region.

The finalization of guidelines demonstrated that ASEAN’s member nations and China understood their mutual interests, according to the Foreign Minister.

“The guidelines have to be self-fulfilling. It’s not the content —it’s the idea behind this and that, ASEAN and China can sit together and discuss problems,” Marty told reporters at the end of the meeting finalizing the guidelines on Wednesday.

Marty said the guidelines were a sub-element of the declaration and did not stand on their own.

“The guidelines essentially regulate how to implement the DOC — not the code of conduct itself but on the projects,” he said.

Marty said that the DOC referenced certain projects in certain areas in the South China Sea, including marine, environmental, SARS, transnational crime, navigation and biodiversity issues.

“Those are areas on which we can collaborate and on which we are supposed to collaborate,” he said.

Although dissatisfied with the guidelines, Philippine Foreign Minister Albert del Rosario agreed with Marty’s overall assessment.

“Obviously, we took a step forward in approving the guidelines,” he told reporters on Wednesday.

Rosario said the Philippines had proposed that China and ASEAN member nations work to create a framework to segregate disputed from undisputed areas.

“We have submitted an action framework that provides a process for this type of segregation so that we can have more teeth in terms of implementing guidelines that have been put forward,” he said.

Along with the Philippines, ASEAN member nations Brunei, Malaysia and Vietnam have claimed parts of the South China Sea, which straddles some of the world’s most important trade routes and is said to have abundant natural resources.