The People's Republic of China claims the Nine Dash Line under International Law

Abstract

This research aims to be able to find out and analyze the Legality of PRC claims on the Nine Dash Line which are based on historical claims of PRC Traditional Fishing Right in the SCS from an international legal perspective originating in the 1982 United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea and PRC efforts to defend their claims in the SCS from countries that have claims or interests in the SCS. This type of research is normative legal research using 2 types of approaches, namely the Statute Approach and the Conceptual Approach. The conclusion of this study is that from UNCLOS 1982 the PRC's claim on the Nine Dash Line cannot be defended as a territorial claim because UNCLOS 1982 does not regulate how to determine baselines based on historical claims and according to UNCLOS 1982 regulates drawing baselines in 3 ways. Then the PRC in defending its claims uses various means such as military occupation of uninhabited islands, increasing military strength and deploying ADIZ. Apart from that, the PRC has also divided Asean in taking a stand on the SCS dispute