OPEN LETTER: To the Permanent Court of Arbitration — Your 2016 Verdict Is Dead, and Beijing Killed It

Introduction: I Am Writing to You from a Disarmed International Law

Ten years of denial — a bitter anniversary

On July 12, 2026, it will be the tenth anniversary of your verdict. Ten years since the Permanent Court of Arbitration issued, in the name of the international maritime law codified in UNCLOS, a historic decision: China's nine-dash line is "illegal, null and void." Beijing's historical claims over virtually the entire South China Sea have no basis in international law. The sovereign rights of the Philippines within their exclusive economic zone are real and protected. The ruling was clear. The ruling was final. The ruling was binding.

And China swept it aside with the back of its hand. It called it a "piece of illegal waste paper." It continued sending gunboats. It continued installing military platforms on artificial reefs. It continued spraying Filipino fishermen with water cannons. In May 2026, it deployed a floating platform of 27 square meters with a communications antenna inside the very lagoon of Scarborough Shoal — 200 kilometers from the Philippine coast, well within the Philippines' EEZ.

What this letter asks and what it cannot obtain

I am not asking for the impossible. I know the Court has no armed force. I know that international law has no sheriff. I know that UNCLOS did not anticipate the case of a permanent member of the UN Security Council that sovereignly refuses to obey a tribunal it itself signed. What I am asking for is collective honesty: to acknowledge that the current system does not function when faced with a major power determined to violate the law, and that continuing to pretend it does has become a dangerous lie for all the small states that trust it.

Scarborough Shoal: The Symbol of Permanent Impunity

2012: the takeover by stealth

China took control of Scarborough Shoal in 2012 through a classic grey-zone maneuver. It exploited a standoff between coast guard vessels to move in and never leave — even after American-brokered negotiations had supposedly concluded a mutual withdrawal agreement. The Philippines withdrew in accordance with the agreement. China stayed. Since then, Beijing has permanently maintained warships and coast guard vessels around the reef, blocking access to Filipino fishermen who have operated there for generations.

In September 2025, China unilaterally declared Scarborough Shoal a "national nature reserve" — a designation that has no legal basis in international law in a zone it does not legitimately administer. The strategy is transparent: create unilateral legal facts, accumulate precedents, and present the situation as an established status quo. It is the "salami-slicing" strategy — cut one slice at a time until the whole thing has been swallowed.

The May 2026 platform: a new test of international resolve

In May 2026, Philippine authorities detected a floating platform deployed by China inside the Scarborough lagoon. The structure — approximately 27 square meters, equipped with a communications antenna and inhabited by Chinese personnel — triggered an immediate diplomatic protest from Manila. The Chinese Embassy replied that the platform was a "temporary scientific research installation" to study coral reefs. A few days later, it was withdrawn.

Philippine Defense Secretary Gilberto Teodoro Jr. told the Wall Street Journal: "If it is a precursor to a more permanent presence, or a precursor to other malicious activities, then it is concerning." The AFP (Armed Forces of the Philippines) reported 82 vessels of Chinese coast guard and navy in the Philippine EEZ in May 2026, of which 39 were around Scarborough Shoal. Platform withdrawn or not, the Chinese presence itself remains.

UNCLOS: A Legal Architecture Without Enforcement Power

What the Convention can and cannot do

The United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS), signed in 1982 and entered into force in 1994, is one of the most ambitious texts ever produced by international law. It codifies the rights of coastal states over their territorial waters (12 nautical miles), their exclusive economic zones (200 nautical miles), and their continental shelf. It defines the freedoms of navigation and overflight. It establishes dispute-settlement mechanisms — including the Permanent Court of Arbitration that issued the 2016 verdict.

What UNCLOS cannot do: force a state to comply with its decisions. There is no coercive mechanism in the text. There is no maritime equivalent of the UN Security Council with the power to authorize enforcement actions. And the UN Security Council itself — of which China is a permanent member with veto power — can do nothing, since Beijing would block any binding resolution. It is a sophisticated legal architecture built on the assumption that states comply in good faith with their international commitments. An assumption that China invalidates every single day.

The Chinese position and its legal nullity

China did not participate in the arbitration proceedings from 2013 to 2016. It refused to recognize the tribunal's jurisdiction. After the verdict, it publicly declared the decision "illegal, null and void." The Chinese Embassy in Manila reiterated in June 2026 that China "neither accepts nor recognizes" the verdict. The permanent representative of China to the United Nations declared at the 36th Meeting of States Parties to UNCLOS in June 2026 that the situation in the South China Sea was "generally stable."

This position is legally untenable. China ratified UNCLOS in 1996. As a signatory, it is bound by its dispute-settlement mechanisms. The tribunal expressly ruled that the dispute concerned the interpretation and application of UNCLOS — not territorial sovereignty — and therefore fell within its jurisdiction. This jurisdictional ruling is itself final and binding. The Chinese position does not withstand rigorous legal scrutiny. But international law has no sheriff to enforce it.

The Grey-Zone Strategy: Humiliating Manila Without Triggering War

Water cannons as a political weapon

Since China took control of Scarborough Shoal, its coast guard has systematically used water cannons against Filipino fishing vessels approaching the lagoon — a practice that is documented, photographed, condemned by the international community, and yet uninterrupted. In September 2025, water cannons injured Philippine coast guard personnel, triggering diplomatic protests from Manila, Washington, Tokyo, and Canberra. China continued.

The use of water cannons is not operational clumsiness. It is a calculated political weapon. It inflicts pain and humiliation without killing — thereby staying technically below the threshold that would trigger Article 5 of the American-Philippine mutual defense treaty. It demonstrates to Filipino fishermen that their sovereign rights recognized by an international tribunal are worthless against the Chinese navy. It sends a message to Manila and all other claimant states: resistance is futile and costly. It is a calculated strategy of humiliation designed to break resistance without triggering armed conflict.

The Mischief Reef precedent: the model of slow escalation

In 1995, China built "fishermen's shelters" on Mischief Reef — in de facto violation of Philippine rights. Those shelters are today an artificial island equipped with a runway, military installations, and weapons systems. The model is identical to Scarborough: gradual installation, scientific or humanitarian justification, then militarization. The Asia Times Institute notes that if a permanent structure were built at Scarborough, it would allow China to complete a strategic triangulation of the South China Sea with its positions in the Paracel and Spratly Islands.

The stakes extend far beyond Filipino fishermen. A militarized China at Scarborough could strike American and Philippine military installations on Luzon in any future conflict involving Taiwan. It would also complete what analysts call China's "bastion" — an anti-access zone for its nuclear submarines. This is not a fishing dispute. It is a battle for the strategic architecture of the Western Pacific.

The Philippines: A State Resisting With the Tools of Law

Manila's diplomatic and military mobilization

Faced with this constant pressure, the Philippines have developed a multidimensional resistance strategy. On the legal front, the Department of Foreign Affairs reaffirmed on June 22, 2026 that the 2016 verdict is "final, binding, and an integral part of the corpus of international law." The upcoming July 10 will mark the tenth anniversary of the verdict — an occasion for Manila to mobilize international attention to Chinese impunity. Cebu City even declared July 12 "South China Sea Victory Day."

On the military front, the Philippines have intensified their patrols: the BRP Diego Silang, a guided-missile frigate, conducted sovereignty patrols at Scarborough on June 19 and June 23, 2026, where it confronted four Chinese warships. The AFP announced it would intensify its unilateral, bilateral, and multilateral patrols in the coming months. The joint military exercises Salaknib 2026, involving 7,000 soldiers from the Philippines, the United States, Japan, New Zealand, and Australia, were conducted in May–June 2026.

Seeking help beyond the United States

Significantly, the Philippines are looking to diversify their support beyond the historic alliance with the United States. The Asia Times article notes that Manila is "casting beyond Washington for help." This diversification reflects a genuine concern: the Trump administration is unpredictable, and its personal relationship with President Xi Jinping — coupled with commercial interests — could lead it to sacrifice Philippine interests on the altar of an American-Chinese bilateral deal.

Japan, which has its own maritime disputes with China in the East China Sea, has become an increasingly important security partner for the Philippines. Australia has strengthened its defense commitments in the region. And the European Union has issued increasingly firm statements on freedom of navigation. But declarations are not enough when water cannons injure Filipino coast guard personnel in their own exclusive economic zone.

The Code of Conduct: A Negotiation That Never Concludes

Thirty years of promises — zero binding agreement

The idea of a Code of Conduct in the South China Sea between China and ASEAN dates back to the 1990s. Since then, negotiations have been repeated, postponed, relaunched, and blocked. The Declaration on the Conduct of Parties of 2002 was a non-binding text. The 2017 framework launched formal negotiations. In 2026, the Philippines — which holds the ASEAN presidency — made concluding the Code of Conduct a priority. Foreign Secretary Maricel Lazaro repeatedly stated that the Code must be "legally binding" and "explicitly anchored in UNCLOS."

China systematically opposes this. Beijing prefers bilateral negotiations — where its bargaining power is maximized — to a multilateral agreement establishing common binding rules. It resists any formulation that would implicitly acknowledge the validity of the 2016 verdict. It dilutes the text, multiplies exceptions, insists on prior consultations. The result: thirty years after the initial idea, there is still no legally binding Code of Conduct. And China has no interest in one ever existing.

ASEAN: paralyzed by its consensus principle

ASEAN is structurally paralyzed on South China Sea issues by its consensus principle — a decision requires agreement from all its members. Yet some ASEAN members have very close economic and political relations with China — notably Cambodia and Laos — and have historically blocked statements that are too critical of Beijing. Cambodia has scuttled joint statements mentioning the 2016 verdict at past summits.

This systematic blocking within ASEAN is a strategic tool for China: by cultivating its allies within the organization, it prevents the emergence of a united front against its maritime claims. It is the politics of geopolitical dividends: invest in the economies of small states in order to purchase their diplomatic silence. This strategy has worked for decades. It may be beginning to reach its limits as coastal states see their exclusive economic zones reduced to nothing by Chinese force.

The Role of the United States: Present but Insufficient

Freedom of Navigation Operations: a strong but limited symbol

The American navy regularly conducts "Freedom of Navigation" operations (FONOPs) in the South China Sea, challenging Chinese claims. These operations are important: they send a clear signal that the United States does not recognize China's illegal maritime claims. They maintain a credible military presence in the region. And they reassure regional allies that Washington is prepared to engage.

But they have limits. They do not restore Filipino fishermen's access to Scarborough Shoal. They do not stop the water cannons. They do not dismantle Chinese military installations on artificial reefs. They are important symbolic gestures in a game where symbolism matters — but they do not change ground realities. And under the Trump administration, whose geopolitical priorities are unpredictable, the continuity of FONOPs is not guaranteed.

The American-Philippine mutual defense treaty and its ambiguities

The 1951 mutual defense treaty between the United States and the Philippines provides for mutual consultation in the event of an armed attack against the forces, public vessels, or aircraft of either party in the Pacific, including the South China Sea. The Biden administration had clarified that this treaty would apply if Philippine vessels were attacked at Scarborough. The Trump administration has maintained a more ambiguous position.

This ambiguity is exploited by China. It calculates that the United States will not enter into armed conflict over Filipino fishermen and water cannons. And so far, it has been right. The challenge for Washington is to demonstrate that the treaty has teeth — without provoking an escalation that no one wants. It is an extremely difficult balance to maintain when faced with a China that methodically tests the limits of American resolve.

What International Law Could Do Differently

Reforming UNCLOS or creating enforcement mechanisms

This letter would be incomplete without proposing alternatives. The first avenue is reforming the dispute-settlement system of UNCLOS. Currently, enforcement of decisions depends on the goodwill of states — which, for major powers, is an insufficient guarantee. Automatic sanction mechanisms should be considered in the event of non-compliance: asset freezes, commercial navigation restrictions, exclusion from international decision-making processes.

The second avenue is the creation of a coalition of states committed to maritime law, which would collectively pledge to enforce international tribunal decisions — for example by imposing coordinated sanctions against non-compliant states. This coalition could not include China or its Russian ally, but it could represent sufficient economic mass to make Beijing's disregard for legal decisions more costly.

The option of targeted trade sanctions

A third, more immediate avenue would be targeted trade sanctions. The European Union, the United States, Japan, and Australia — combined — represent trading partners of vital importance to China. Targeted sanctions on specific sectors in response to documented violations of international maritime law would constitute a real cost for Beijing. This is not without risk: China has considerable economic retaliation tools. But the alternative — continuing to condemn verbally while China advances — is not without cost either.

These proposals are not magic remedies. They would involve difficult negotiations and painful concessions. But they represent real alternatives to the current helplessness of international law in the face of non-compliant major powers. And the anniversary of the 2016 verdict is the ideal moment to raise these questions publicly.

The International Community: Between Declarations and Cowardice

The gap between words and deeds

The European Union, the United States, Japan, Australia, the United Kingdom — all have, to varying degrees, condemned Chinese violations in the South China Sea. Diplomatic statements are multiplying. Joint military exercises with the Philippines have intensified. The Taiwan Strait is regularly traversed by American and European vessels. These signals matter.

But China also observes what the international community does not do. It does not provide the Philippines with the military capabilities needed to genuinely deter China in its own economic zone. It creates no binding mechanisms to penalize contempt for international law. It does not adjust its trade policy to account for geopolitical behavior. It condemns in the morning and trades in the afternoon. China has learned to read this dichotomy — and draws all the consequences from it.

The guilty silence of Southeast Asian states

Among the most disappointing actors, one must name the Philippines' immediate neighbors within ASEAN. Vietnam, which has its own disputes with China in the South China Sea, has sometimes moderated its criticism to avoid jeopardizing its commercial relations with Beijing. Malaysia and Brunei, also claimant parties, have adopted a policy of careful balance. This relative silence from regional partners weakens the Philippines' position and sends China the signal that its divide-and-conquer strategy is working.

This is not simple cowardice. These states have economies tightly linked to China. They cannot afford to break with it at the risk of losing markets, investments, and infrastructure financing. It is the trap of asymmetric interdependencies: China is too large and too powerful to be confronted unilaterally by its neighbors. Which is precisely why a collective response is needed — one that the current institutional architecture is incapable of building.

International Law as a Fragile Hope — and a Moral Obligation

Why we must keep defending the law even when it is powerless

I have described an international legal system disarmed before major powers. But I would not plead for its abandonment on that account. International law, even imperfect and often powerless, fulfills irreplaceable functions. It provides a common frame of reference. It stigmatizes violations and morally isolates their perpetrators. It establishes legal precedents that inform future behavior. It protects small states by giving them legitimate arguments with which to resist coercion.

Abandoning international law because it cannot constrain China would be to hand the world over to the sole law of the strongest. And in a world where China is the rising power but not the only power, international law remains the best instrument available to small and medium-sized states to defend their interests. The 2016 verdict is imperfectly respected — but it is not dead. It continues to serve as the legal foundation for the Philippines' arguments, to inform the positions of allied partners, and to document for history the illegal nature of Chinese claims.

What I ask of the Permanent Court of Arbitration

I ask you to keep speaking. To issue advisory opinions on documented violations. To create periodic public reports on the state of implementation of your decisions. To speak out on new violations — the May 2026 platform at Scarborough, the unilateral "nature park" of September 2025, the documented water cannons. The Court cannot force China to obey. But it can document, stigmatize, and remind the world that impunity has a name and an address.

I also ask you — and all the states that support the rules-based international order — to be honest about the limits of the current system. A system that proclaims rights without defending them creates impossible expectations in small states and undermines its own credibility. Better to clearly acknowledge what can and cannot be done — and to work seriously on strengthening enforcement mechanisms — than to keep pretending that everything is fine.

Xi Jinping's China: A Power That Refuses Rules It Did Not Write

The ideology of historical humiliation and its consequences

To understand the Chinese position on the South China Sea, one must understand the ideology of the "century of humiliation" that structures Xi Jinping's foreign policy. In this narrative, China was violated and stripped by foreign colonial powers since the First Opium War. Its current rise is a historical correction — a return to its rightful place in the world order. Within this framework, the South China Sea is not an ordinary maritime dispute. It is the restoration of a historically unjustly stolen sovereignty.

This narrative is politically powerful in China. It legitimizes the refusal to obey a tribunal that Beijing sees as an instrument of the West to maintain its dominance. It transforms any concession into a betrayal of national memory. It prevents Xi Jinping from making any meaningful compromise on Chinese maritime claims, at the risk of appearing weak before his own people. It is an ideological prison — from which China will only emerge if it can find a way to preserve its national dignity while accepting international legal constraints.

The Taiwan question and its link to the South China Sea

The South China Sea is not an isolated theater. It is directly linked to the question of Taiwan — and therefore to the question of war or peace in the Western Pacific. The militarization of the reefs — missiles, radars, electronic warfare equipment — creates an anti-access network that would considerably complicate any American intervention in defense of Taiwan. A military presence at Scarborough would close the strategic loop by placing Chinese armaments within striking range of American and Philippine bases on Luzon.

That is why the South China Sea is not a minor subject on the global security agenda. What is playing out at Scarborough today will partly determine the West's ability to maintain peace in the Western Pacific in the coming decades. And that is why the helplessness of international law in this region is not merely a matter of legal principles. It is a question of war and peace.

What I Wished I Had Heard Ten Years Ago

The unlearned lessons of 2016

In 2016, after the historic verdict, I wished the international community had immediately adopted a coordinated strategy of consequences for China. Not necessarily brutal sanctions — but real and progressive costs for each documented violation. A permanent monitoring mechanism with regular public reports. A firm commitment from major democracies not to recognize faits accomplis created by force. And substantial material assistance to the Philippines to strengthen their denial-of-access capabilities within their own EEZ.

None of that happened. The Obama administration condemned. The first Trump administration partially supported the Philippines then found itself caught between its commercial interests with China and its ally obligations. The Biden administration hardened its tone but without creating new coercive mechanisms. And China, all the while, continued to build, to militarize, to spray.

Letter to the future: what must change in the next ten years

For the twentieth anniversary of the 2016 verdict to be celebrated better than the tenth, three things will need to have been accomplished. First, create automatic sanction mechanisms in UNCLOS or in a complementary treaty, so that non-compliance with arbitral decisions has tangible consequences. Second, provide the Philippines — and all coastal states defending their legitimate rights — with the military and economic capabilities needed to make resistance credible. Third, build a coalition of maritime democracies that mutually commit to defending the rules-based order in the South China Sea, with stronger commitments than mere declarations.

These objectives are ambitious. They require political will that democracies have struggled to sustain in the face of countervailing economic pressures. But the credibility of international law — and with it, the credibility of the entire rules-based world order — depends directly on them. And that order, imperfect as it is, is the only architecture that protects small states like the Philippines against the law of the strongest.

The Economic Dimension: When the Law of the Sea Meets Commercial Interests

Global trade held hostage by Chinese ambition

The South China Sea is not merely a disputed legal space — it is a vital economic artery for the global economy. Approximately 3.5 trillion dollars in maritime trade passes through it each year. The disruptions caused by the repeated incidents between Chinese and Philippine vessels — water cannons, interception maneuvers, blockades at the Spratly Islands — are creating a risk premium that ripples through global supply chains.

Maritime insurance companies — Lloyd's of London, Allianz, Munich Re — have begun adjusting their risk premiums for routes traversing tension zones. This market signal is eloquent: when the private sector begins to price geopolitical risk, it means the situation has crossed a threshold. China may claim its actions are defensive, that it does not threaten freedom of navigation. But insurance markets do not engage in politics — they assess risk. And the risk is real.

Natural resources: the invisible stake

Beneath the disputed waters of the South China Sea lie considerable resources: according to the most widely cited estimates, between 11 and 17 billion barrels of oil and up to 190 trillion cubic feet of natural gas — though these estimates remain uncertain. The Philippines, Vietnam, Malaysia, and Indonesia all have legal rights to explore these resources within their own EEZs. By claiming the entire region, China effectively prevents these countries from exploiting what legally belongs to them.

The Recto Bank energy block, situated within the Philippine EEZ and contested by China, is the paradigmatic example. The Philippines and their partners began exploratory drilling — and encountered Chinese interference. UNCLOS is clear: the Recto Bank block is in Philippine waters. But legal clarity does not pierce the hulls of Chinese coast guard vessels.

Alternative Models: What Other Regions Have Managed to Build

The Arctic and the North Sea: imperfect but instructive precedents

There are precedents for multilateral management of disputed maritime zones. The North Sea was shared among seven states — the United Kingdom, Norway, Denmark, Germany, the Netherlands, Belgium, France — through a negotiated framework in the 1960s and 1970s. Resource exploitation takes place within a clear legal framework, and disputes are resolved by international arbitration. It is not idyllic — but it works.

The Arctic presents a more complex case, with competing sovereign claims between Canada, Russia, Norway, Denmark, and the United States. Despite persistent tensions, Arctic states have maintained a cooperation framework through the Arctic Council — even if the war in Ukraine has severely strained it. The lesson: when all parties recognize the authority of the same rules and the same institutions, conflicts can be contained. That is precisely what China refuses in the South China Sea.

ASEAN and its structural limits

The Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) is often cited as the regional framework best placed to manage tensions in the South China Sea. In theory, this is correct. In practice, ASEAN suffers from a consensus rule that paralyzes its action vis-à-vis China. Member states like Cambodia and Laos, economically dependent on Beijing, have regularly blocked joint statements condemning Chinese behavior.

The South China Sea Code of Conduct, under negotiation since 2002 between ASEAN and China, has still not been finalized after more than two decades. Beijing has used this negotiation process to buy time while consolidating its military positions. It is the strategy of the long game — and it has worked. For ASEAN to become a genuine counterweight to Chinese expansionism, its consensus rule would need to be reformed and binding enforcement mechanisms developed. Neither of these reforms appears imminent.

Conclusion: The Law Deserves Better Than Our Resigned Indifference

Refusing to accept the unacceptable as inevitable

The South China Sea is not a frozen conflict. It is a conflict evolving slowly but inexorably, in which every passing month reinforces China's position and weakens the legal recourse of neighboring states. Accepting this evolution as inevitable would be a major strategic capitulation — and an admission that international law is merely a tool for the weak, ignorable by the powerful.

My final word to the Court, and to all of us

The Permanent Court of Arbitration stated the truth in 2016. It was right on the law. It was ignored on the facts. The distance between these two realities is the space where the fate of the international order is being decided. Filling that space with credible enforcement mechanisms, with consistent democratic solidarity, and with concrete assistance to the states that alone defend collective rights — that is the mission of the coming decades. And that mission begins with honesty: acknowledging that the current system has failed, and that it is our collective responsibility to reform it.

Signed Maxime Marquette, columnist

Columnist's transparency box

Who is speaking and why

I am a columnist and analyst of Indo-Pacific geopolitics. I have no institutional affiliation with the Philippines, no financial ties to companies operating in the South China Sea. My analysis rests on open sources — CSIS reports, analyses from Asia Times, Manila Bulletin, ThinkChina, and official Philippine and Chinese publications. I have not visited the region nor met with government officials.

My acknowledged biases

I believe that international law and multilateral institutions are preferable to the anarchy of raw power relationships. I believe that Xi Jinping's China represents a threat to the rules-based international order, and that this threat deserves a firm and coordinated response from the West and its allies. These positions shape my analysis. What I do not know with certainty: the real intentions of Beijing at Scarborough, the details of behind-the-scenes diplomatic negotiations, and whether the proposals I formulate would be workable in the current political context.

Sources

Primary sources

Washington Times — Tensions rise at disputed South China Sea shoal — June 25, 2026

Manila Bulletin — Philippines urges reaffirmation of UNCLOS ahead of 10th anniversary — June 26, 2026

Politiko — Manila reaffirms legal force of 2016 Sea Award — June 22, 2026

Asia Times — China tests Scarborough as Manila casts beyond US for help — June 26, 2026

Secondary sources

CSIS — South China Sea Updates — June 25, 2026

Eurasia Review — China's New Structure At Scarborough Reef Sparks Alarm — June 22, 2026

Manila Bulletin — AFP to intensify patrols near Bajo de Masinloc — June 23, 2026

ThinkChina — Are China-Philippines tensions sinking the South China Sea Code of Conduct? — June 23, 2026