At the sideline of the Sunday seminar, Nico Schrijver, academic director of the Leiden University's Grotius Center for International Legal Studies, said the big powers, such as the United States, should be prevented from getting involved in the South China Sea disputes and these should be solved by the claimant countries.
"China has very long tradition of peaceful settlements of international disputes and we could like to learn from China," said Schrijver, who is professor of peace, human rights and sea dispute settlement. "Maybe I am the only one born in the sea level today and sea is so important for us and you have to cooperate with your neighbors."
Abraham Sofaer, senior fellow at the Stanford University Hoover Institution in the U.S., said arbitration, raised by the Philippines but refused by China, has brought a lot of difficulties and anxiety, which were not good for any parties.
"We (The U.S.) should be more responsible in talking to our ally get back to the status quo and get this dispute resolved in peaceful way," Sofaer said, adding that the dispute between China and the Philippines had let him know the limit of the international laws.
Sofaer said the public in the United States could not easily access balanced reporting from the media, as they intended to play up conflict. "It is happening every day in the South China Sea dispute, which been reported as negative, counterproductive, aggressive action from China," Sofaer said, adding that it was misleading.
Sofaer suggested the related parties should learn from the wisdom of late leader Deng Xiaoping's in calling for assuming sovereignty and setting issue aside to pursue the joint development.. "We should pursue such call," said Sofaer.
"And the U.S., should convince the its ally to curb the harm its litigation has caused by finding a way to restore the status quo with China at a bargaining table," he said. "And I believe it will withdraw the appeal to the arbitral turbine because the judgments of tribunal could not be enforced finally."
Voices of China's scholars
Hu Dekun, Dean at Wuhan University's China Institute of Boundary and Ocean Studies, said China could offer mountains of documents, records and historic heritages to prove that since ancient times, Chinese people had discovered and used the South China Sea islands and reefs.
"Our ancestors have been fishing and trading on the regions and successively, China has owned the sovereignty and exercising the jurisdiction over the South China Sea islands," Hu said.
Despite the Philippines and the Vietnamese occupying some islands in the South China Sea, China has refrained from raising disputes. "But in the recent years since the United States has returned to the region, the Philippines have begun to claim the sovereignty of the islands, which are owned by China, and this is the very nature of the dispute," Hu said.
But Liu Huawen, assistant director at the Institute of International Law of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, said China had enough legitimate rights under international law to refuse to accept the arbitration, which was unilaterally initiated by the Philippines.
Meanwhile, the tribunal has no jurisdiction over the Philippines' territorial claims to several islands or rocks, because when ratifying the UNCLOS in 2006, China had the right to opt out of various clauses. It did so for compulsory arbitration of maritime boundary delimitation and historical rights by the tribunal.
"So I think any verdict from the tribunal is invalid and the Philippines should come to negotiation table with China to solve the dispute and the U.S. should stop from help escalating intentions in the region right now," Liu said.
