http://www.wantchinatimes.com/news-subclass-cnt.aspx?cid=1701&MainCatID=17&id=20110208000086
這是有關領域管轄和引渡問題的傳統國際法議題，許老師本週六在台大校總區的霖澤館（法學院）有一場座談，同學可以去聽聽看喲！
The jurisdiction dispute that arose after the Philippines deported 14 Taiwanese nationals suspected of fraud to China for crimes against Chinese nationals indicates Taiwan's challenges in maintaining ties with Southeast Asian countries, despite improved cross-strait relations.
Taiwan's relations, especially in trade with Southeast Asia, regressed after the Democratic Progressive Party came to power in 2000 due to increased tensions with China.
As Taiwan's relations with China have a great influence on the island's trade with Southeast Asia, which improved after the cross-strait economic cooperation framework agreement was signed in 2010, Taiwan cannot afford to see relations worsen as its economic strength could again be undermined.
Taiwan's Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) should be held responsible for its slow reaction to the current dispute since it did not have first-hand information about the arrests involving the Taiwanese nationals last December.
While Taiwan has to protest against the Philippines bowing down to China's demands to hand over the Taiwanese suspects, the MOFA should work on building closer ties with Southeastern Asian countries, particularly in trade, education and culture, even though Taiwan and China have ceased the fight for diplomatic allies.
Chinese pressure to extradite the Taiwanese suspects is understandable, since Taiwan had ruled in a similar previous case that the defendants were innocent, which meant the Chinese victims are unable to seek compensation. Fraud is a felony that carries a sentence of 10 years to life imprisonment in China, while the maximum jail term for the same crime is five years in Taiwan.
However, since Taiwan and China have different human rights standards, the location of the trial has a significant impact on the rights of the accused Taiwanese nationals.
Taiwan should make it clear to China that the island is toughening its stand against crime with heavier sentences in order to prevent similar disputes in the future, especially since both sides signed a judicial cooperation agreement in 2009.
Taiwan should also be credited for its restrained official reaction to the matter, focusing only on the return of the Taiwanese suspects. It would increase trust between the two sides if China hands back the Taiwanese nationals to stand trial in Taiwan after it completes its own investigation.
(issued by TA wei-en)
2011年2月25日 星期五
Warning: old stone temples can start wars
甫里維哈寺位於泰國與柬埔寨之間邊界山脈中一塊高地（Dangrek）上，根據1904年暹羅（泰國舊稱）和法國（當時柬埔寨是法國的保護地）之間的一項條約規定，雙方同意有關此山脈邊界線之劃定，應沿著分水嶺線為之。兩國為此另設立了一個混合委員會，礙於技術因素，當時泰國政府委託由法國調查隊來負責繪製該地區地圖的工作。1908年地圖繪製完成，當時泰國政府收到此地圖時即已發現古寺被標註在柬埔寨的領域內（即山脈分水嶺的另一邊），但卻未表明任何異議（直到1935年）。1953年柬埔寨獨立之後，新政府試圖在該地區確立其領土主權，但因泰國派駐軍隊於古寺，效果有限。1959年10月，柬埔寨向國際法院提起訴訟，請求法院宣告古寺的領土主權屬於柬埔寨，泰國應將其駐紮於古寺的武裝部隊撤離。法院先於1961年確立對本案的管轄權，接著在1962年對本案進行實質審理與裁決，判定古寺是屬於柬埔寨。(issued by TA wei-en)
Thai-Cambodian conflictFeb 10th 2011
KANTHARALAK
SITTING on her straw mat, Pisamai Poonsuk recalls how her family of ten fled their border village in a pickup truck soon after the shells began falling. After staying the night with relatives, the family moved into a temporary camp. Ms Pisamai, a cassava farmer, is waiting for the all-clear to go home. She prays the ceasefire will hold between the Thai and Cambodian soldiers ranged along a disputed border. She has little time for Thai jingoism. “We should trade with the Cambodians. We should be brothers.”
Fat chance. The clashes that erupted on February 4th were the fiercest since July 2008, when the two armies first began rumbling at each other in the vicinity of Preah Vihear, an 11th-century Khmer temple that Cambodia wants to develop for mass tourism. Six people died and dozens more were injured during four days of fighting. The temple itself was only slightly damaged. Each side accuses the other of firing first into populated areas.
Though the shelling has stopped, any ceasefire remains fragile as long as nationalists in both countries keep stoking the dispute. Thailand’s prime minister, Abhisit Vejjajiva, faces street protests by the ultra-conservative People’s Alliance for Democracy (PAD) over his alleged failure to defend Thai soil. Cambodia’s prime minister, Hun Sen, does not tolerate protests but is sensitive to claims of lost sovereignty. He quickly castigated war-mongering Thailand and called for UN peacekeepers on the border.
It is not the first time that an ancient temple has bred violence. In 2003 anti-Thai riots erupted in Phnom Penh after a Thai actress was misquoted as saying that Angkor Wat, which appears on the Cambodian flag, belonged to Thailand. On February 8th PAD leaders said that Thai troops should threaten to invade, forcing a return of Preah Vihear. To Cambodians, resentful of being pushed around by big neighbours, this is bully-boy stuff.
In 1962 the World Court ruled that Preah Vihear, which sits on a ridge, was on Cambodian soil. But it did not rule on overlapping claims to the temple’s hinterland. In 2008 UNESCO listed the temple as a World Heritage site, to the delight of Cambodia’s tourist industry. The PAD cried foul over what it claimed was a loss of Thai territory. The controversy became a pretext for marathon protests that helped topple an elected government and sweep Mr Abhisit into power. Now the PAD vows to topple its erstwhile ally.
Despite international concern, Mr Hun Sen’s plea for UN intervention seems a non-starter. Thailand insists that bilateral talks can resolve the border dispute and rejects outside mediation. This did not stop Indonesia from dipping a toe into the row. It currently holds the rotating chair of the Association of South-East Asian Nations (ASEAN), to which the two feuding parties belong (see Banyan). Its foreign minister, Marty Natalegawa, flew to both capitals this week for talks. But, an ASEAN diplomat sniffs, Indonesia should keep its own ambitions in check, lest the tables are turned in future. Nobody wants anyone “meddling in his own affairs”, he says. So much for Ms Pisamai’s brotherhood.
Thai-Cambodian conflictFeb 10th 2011
KANTHARALAK
SITTING on her straw mat, Pisamai Poonsuk recalls how her family of ten fled their border village in a pickup truck soon after the shells began falling. After staying the night with relatives, the family moved into a temporary camp. Ms Pisamai, a cassava farmer, is waiting for the all-clear to go home. She prays the ceasefire will hold between the Thai and Cambodian soldiers ranged along a disputed border. She has little time for Thai jingoism. “We should trade with the Cambodians. We should be brothers.”
Fat chance. The clashes that erupted on February 4th were the fiercest since July 2008, when the two armies first began rumbling at each other in the vicinity of Preah Vihear, an 11th-century Khmer temple that Cambodia wants to develop for mass tourism. Six people died and dozens more were injured during four days of fighting. The temple itself was only slightly damaged. Each side accuses the other of firing first into populated areas.
Though the shelling has stopped, any ceasefire remains fragile as long as nationalists in both countries keep stoking the dispute. Thailand’s prime minister, Abhisit Vejjajiva, faces street protests by the ultra-conservative People’s Alliance for Democracy (PAD) over his alleged failure to defend Thai soil. Cambodia’s prime minister, Hun Sen, does not tolerate protests but is sensitive to claims of lost sovereignty. He quickly castigated war-mongering Thailand and called for UN peacekeepers on the border.
It is not the first time that an ancient temple has bred violence. In 2003 anti-Thai riots erupted in Phnom Penh after a Thai actress was misquoted as saying that Angkor Wat, which appears on the Cambodian flag, belonged to Thailand. On February 8th PAD leaders said that Thai troops should threaten to invade, forcing a return of Preah Vihear. To Cambodians, resentful of being pushed around by big neighbours, this is bully-boy stuff.
In 1962 the World Court ruled that Preah Vihear, which sits on a ridge, was on Cambodian soil. But it did not rule on overlapping claims to the temple’s hinterland. In 2008 UNESCO listed the temple as a World Heritage site, to the delight of Cambodia’s tourist industry. The PAD cried foul over what it claimed was a loss of Thai territory. The controversy became a pretext for marathon protests that helped topple an elected government and sweep Mr Abhisit into power. Now the PAD vows to topple its erstwhile ally.
Despite international concern, Mr Hun Sen’s plea for UN intervention seems a non-starter. Thailand insists that bilateral talks can resolve the border dispute and rejects outside mediation. This did not stop Indonesia from dipping a toe into the row. It currently holds the rotating chair of the Association of South-East Asian Nations (ASEAN), to which the two feuding parties belong (see Banyan). Its foreign minister, Marty Natalegawa, flew to both capitals this week for talks. But, an ASEAN diplomat sniffs, Indonesia should keep its own ambitions in check, lest the tables are turned in future. Nobody wants anyone “meddling in his own affairs”, he says. So much for Ms Pisamai’s brotherhood.
A sea of disputes
這是有關國家間爭端領土的問題，剛好與老師下週開始要談的國家領域有關。台灣也是這起爭端中的一造，值得大家關注。(issued by TA wei-en)
Feb 21st 2011, 8:44 by Banyan
TWO truths about the disputes in the South China Sea are well-recognised: they are extremely complex, and much misunderstood. An illuminating day-long conference at the Institute of South-East Asian Studies in Singapore on February 18th brought home a third. There is no realistic prospect of a settlement in the foreseeable future. The best that can be hoped is to manage the disputes without any resort to armed conflict.
Part of the difficulty is that the dispute has so many aspects—or rather there are so many separate disputes. The territorial issue that receives so much attention is itself a plethora of different and overlapping claims. China and Vietnam claim sovereignty over the Paracel island chain, from which China evicted Vietnam in 1974, in the dying days of the Vietnam war. Taiwan—because it is the “Republic of China”—mirrors China’s claim, so that huge unresolved dispute also has a bearing on this one. The same three parties also claim the Spratly archipelago, to the south. But in the south, Malaysia, the Philippines and Brunei also have partial claims.
Some of these arguments might in theory be soluble under the United Nations Convention of the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS), established in 1982. Some of the parties have tried to align their claim with UNCLOS. In 2009, for example, Malaysia and Vietnam made a joint submission, showing where they thought their claims lay, based on their continental shelves. This implied that the Spratlys—a collection of reefs, rocks and tiny islands—were all too small to support human habitation and hence have their own exclusive economic zones (EEZs) under UNCLOS.
China, however, objected to that submission and tabled its own map, with nine dotted lines outlining its claim. Joined up, the dotted lines give it not just the two chains, but almost the whole sea. There seems to be no basis for this in UNCLOS. But China points to history. It says the map has been in use since the Republic of China published it in 1946, and, until quite recently, nobody minded. Indonesia, in turn, subsequently objected to China’s objection, which gave China a claim over some Indonesian waters, too. According to American officials, China has upped the ante by talking of its territorial claims in the South China Sea as a “core” national interest, on a par with Tibet and Taiwan.
There is a huge amount at stake. Besides fisheries, the sea, particularly around the Spratlys, is believed to be enormously rich in hydrocarbons. The lure of such riches ought to make it attractive to devise joint-development mechanisms so that all could benefit. In practice, the resources potentially available make it even harder for any country to moderate its claim.
The sea is also a vital shipping route, accounting for a big chunk of world trade. It is the importance of the freedom of navigation and of overflight that has given America its pretext for louder involvement. This was initially welcomed by the members of the Association of South-East Asian Nations when voiced at a regional forum in Hanoi in July last year, So fiercely did China object to America’s rather disingenuous offer of “mediation”, however, that some countries may now be ruing it.
So a second related dispute is between two regional superpowers: China and America. In particular, America and China differ over whether military activities are permissible in another country's EEZ. America insists they are. China objects to them and has on occasion harassed America’s spy planes and survey ships.
A third dispute is between China and ASEAN. These two reached a common “Declaration on Conduct” (DoC) in 2002 in an attempt to minimise the risk of conflict. But efforts to turn it into a formal and binding code have got nowhere, partly because of China’s anger at ASEAN’s attempts to develop a common approach.
China argues that ASEAN has no role in territorial issues, and insists on negotiating with the other claimants bilaterally. ASEAN sees this as an effort to pick off its members one by one. It argues that its own charter forces members to consult, as they do before each working group on the code of conduct (the next one is due in March).
Optimists point out that, distant though any settlement seems to be, at least the DoC has helped keep tensions down. Indeed, since 1988, when China and Vietnam clashed near the Spratlys, there have been no serious armed flare-ups. Tension rose in 1995, when China was found to have built on Mischief Reef, claimed by the Philippines. Fishermen are sometimes locked up for encroaching in another country’s claim. But the risk of escalation into conflict has seemed limited.
It is even possible to claim that the “self-restraint” the DoC calls for is being observed, since no new uninhabited islands or rocks have been occupied. However, that may be because none of those that is left is remotely big enough, and on those that were already occupied, building has continued, in some cases as if the claimants hope to turn rocks, or even “low-tide elevations”, into real islands—a practice not recognised under UNCLOS.
In their complexity, the South China Sea disputes provide material for endless scholarly bickering. Now that America has made it a focus for its re-engagement in Asia’s seas as a superpower and guarantor of the peace, and China has made clear it resents this, they also present some serious risks.
Feb 21st 2011, 8:44 by Banyan
TWO truths about the disputes in the South China Sea are well-recognised: they are extremely complex, and much misunderstood. An illuminating day-long conference at the Institute of South-East Asian Studies in Singapore on February 18th brought home a third. There is no realistic prospect of a settlement in the foreseeable future. The best that can be hoped is to manage the disputes without any resort to armed conflict.
Part of the difficulty is that the dispute has so many aspects—or rather there are so many separate disputes. The territorial issue that receives so much attention is itself a plethora of different and overlapping claims. China and Vietnam claim sovereignty over the Paracel island chain, from which China evicted Vietnam in 1974, in the dying days of the Vietnam war. Taiwan—because it is the “Republic of China”—mirrors China’s claim, so that huge unresolved dispute also has a bearing on this one. The same three parties also claim the Spratly archipelago, to the south. But in the south, Malaysia, the Philippines and Brunei also have partial claims.
Some of these arguments might in theory be soluble under the United Nations Convention of the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS), established in 1982. Some of the parties have tried to align their claim with UNCLOS. In 2009, for example, Malaysia and Vietnam made a joint submission, showing where they thought their claims lay, based on their continental shelves. This implied that the Spratlys—a collection of reefs, rocks and tiny islands—were all too small to support human habitation and hence have their own exclusive economic zones (EEZs) under UNCLOS.
China, however, objected to that submission and tabled its own map, with nine dotted lines outlining its claim. Joined up, the dotted lines give it not just the two chains, but almost the whole sea. There seems to be no basis for this in UNCLOS. But China points to history. It says the map has been in use since the Republic of China published it in 1946, and, until quite recently, nobody minded. Indonesia, in turn, subsequently objected to China’s objection, which gave China a claim over some Indonesian waters, too. According to American officials, China has upped the ante by talking of its territorial claims in the South China Sea as a “core” national interest, on a par with Tibet and Taiwan.
There is a huge amount at stake. Besides fisheries, the sea, particularly around the Spratlys, is believed to be enormously rich in hydrocarbons. The lure of such riches ought to make it attractive to devise joint-development mechanisms so that all could benefit. In practice, the resources potentially available make it even harder for any country to moderate its claim.
The sea is also a vital shipping route, accounting for a big chunk of world trade. It is the importance of the freedom of navigation and of overflight that has given America its pretext for louder involvement. This was initially welcomed by the members of the Association of South-East Asian Nations when voiced at a regional forum in Hanoi in July last year, So fiercely did China object to America’s rather disingenuous offer of “mediation”, however, that some countries may now be ruing it.
So a second related dispute is between two regional superpowers: China and America. In particular, America and China differ over whether military activities are permissible in another country's EEZ. America insists they are. China objects to them and has on occasion harassed America’s spy planes and survey ships.
A third dispute is between China and ASEAN. These two reached a common “Declaration on Conduct” (DoC) in 2002 in an attempt to minimise the risk of conflict. But efforts to turn it into a formal and binding code have got nowhere, partly because of China’s anger at ASEAN’s attempts to develop a common approach.
China argues that ASEAN has no role in territorial issues, and insists on negotiating with the other claimants bilaterally. ASEAN sees this as an effort to pick off its members one by one. It argues that its own charter forces members to consult, as they do before each working group on the code of conduct (the next one is due in March).
Optimists point out that, distant though any settlement seems to be, at least the DoC has helped keep tensions down. Indeed, since 1988, when China and Vietnam clashed near the Spratlys, there have been no serious armed flare-ups. Tension rose in 1995, when China was found to have built on Mischief Reef, claimed by the Philippines. Fishermen are sometimes locked up for encroaching in another country’s claim. But the risk of escalation into conflict has seemed limited.
It is even possible to claim that the “self-restraint” the DoC calls for is being observed, since no new uninhabited islands or rocks have been occupied. However, that may be because none of those that is left is remotely big enough, and on those that were already occupied, building has continued, in some cases as if the claimants hope to turn rocks, or even “low-tide elevations”, into real islands—a practice not recognised under UNCLOS.
In their complexity, the South China Sea disputes provide material for endless scholarly bickering. Now that America has made it a focus for its re-engagement in Asia’s seas as a superpower and guarantor of the peace, and China has made clear it resents this, they also present some serious risks.
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