House to pursue baselines bill
By TJ Burgonio
Philippine Daily Inquirer, INQUIRER.net
First Posted 05:58:00 03/27/2008
MANILA, Philippines -- House leaders said they would go through with plans to pass a controversial bill redefining the country’s archipelagic baselines and would leave it up to international bodies to settle whether this was in consonance with international law.
House Bill 3216 was set for approval on third reading when the Department of Foreign Affairs sought its review after China protested the inclusion of the disputed Spratly islands within the country’s baselines.
Cebu Rep. Antonio Cuenco, chair of the committee on foreign relations, said House leaders would push for approval of the bill anyway.
Out-voting dissenters
“We will go ahead full speed,” he told a press forum.
“I want the House to act decisively on this bill, send it to the Senate for concurrence. If they will amend it, let them propose their amendments, and let’s agree on a final version. Let’s ask the President to sign it into law, and send it forthwith it to UNCLOS [the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea],” he said.
Cuenco said he expected a majority of lawmakers to out-vote dissenters and approve the bill on final reading when Congress resumes sessions on the third week of April.
He said that any motion to recommit the bill to the committee level at this point would be opposed for violating procedures.
Speaker Prospero Nograles said he would not stop a vote on the measure, which he expects to be approved by a majority.
“If Tony Cuenco insists that we vote on it, the leadership will not stop it,” he told reporters. “It is our policy here that the leadership will always support its committee chair.”
The bill, which passed on second reading last December, seeks to amend Republic Acts 3046 and RA 5446, the laws that define the country’s maritime borders but which do not include new methods of defining territorial limits like the extended continental shelf contained in the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS).
Beijing displeased
Beijing expressed displeasure over the bill’s provisions which include the Kalayaan island group in the disputed Spratlys and the Scarborough Shoal off Zambales within the Philippine baselines.
Cuenco and Nograles both said that any “adjustments” could be introduced at the bicameral conference, where the House and Senate versions would be reconciled.
“If there are any defects, these can be cured at the bicameral conference,” Nograles said.
Nograles agreed that chances are “very high” for the bill’s approval on third and final reading since it had been passed on second reading.
They said that ultimately it would be the UNCLOS and the international courts that would judge whether the measure complied with international law.
“Who is to say whether we have deviated or not? Let the UNCLOS say later on that we have not complied with the rules on the drawing of the baseline,” Cuenco said in the forum.
Job for international courts
Nograles agreed: “The other countries can define their own baselines. If there’s a conflict [with our baselines], let the international courts define it.”
“If we don’t draw up our baseline, then what is the basis for settling the dispute?” Nograles said.
The other claimants to the Spratlys are China, Vietnam, Brunei, Malaysia and Taiwan.
“But if all of them draw their baselines, [and] we don’t draw our baseline, they might claim the whole Philippines. We will be on the losing end.”
By passing the baseline bill, the Philippine government would be “coming from a position of strength,” said Cuenco.
The Philippines has to pass legislation redefining the country’s baselines ahead of the May 2009 UN deadline for the submission of country claims to extended continental shelf areas.
Cuenco stressed that the House has to “act decisively” on the measure, and sending it back to the committee level would further delay its passage.
“We have no time to lose. This bill is long overdue. The deadline will expire in May 2009,” he said. With a report from Maila Ager, INQUIRER.net
|
