Game On! ITLOS President Appoints Final 3 Members of Philippines-China Tribunal

Yesterday, President of the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea, Shunji Yanai, announced the appointment of the final three members of the Annex VII UNCLOS tribunal.

International Tribunal on the Law of the Sea (ITLOS) President Shunji Yanai on April 24 transmitted a letter to Philippine Solicitor General Francis Jardeleza, head of the Philippine legal team on the arbitration case, informing Manila of the appointment of Mr. Jean-Pierre Cot (France), Mr. Chris Pinto (Sri Lanka), and Mr. Alfred Soons (The Netherlands.)

Yanai earlier appointed Mr. Stanislaw Pawlak (Poland) as the second member of the tribunal who will represent China in the proceedings. The Philippines, on the other hand, nominated Mr. Rudiger Wolfrum (Germany) to the tribunal.

I have to admit I am a bit surprised that President Yanai did not appoint any arbitrators from East Asia or Southeast Asia. As it turns out, the Annex VII tribunal will have four Europeans, three of whom are currently serving as judges on ITLOS.  Chris Pinto of Sri Lanka will be the only member of the tribunal from Asia (broadly defined).  I would have appointed a Chinese national and a Philippines national, which would be in keeping with the tradition of many other interstate arbitrations.

It turns out that I had the opportunity to meet Philippines Solicitor General Jardeleza, who is spearheading the Philippines arbitration team, just yesterday at an event sponsored by the U.S.-Asia Law Institute at New York University.  I got some great insights in to the strategy behind the Philippines’ decision to pursue arbitration, which I hope to share in a later post.  But for now we can say that the arbitration is going to happen, for sure.

If China continues to ignore the arbitration, it is worth keeping in mind that UNCLOS actually has a provision guiding tribunals in this situation.

Article 9 Default of appearance

If one of the parties to the dispute does not appear before the arbitral tribunal or fails to defend its case, the other party may request the tribunal to continue the proceedings and to make its award. Absence of a party or failure of a party to defend its case shall not constitute a bar to the proceedings. Before making its award, the arbitral tribunal must satisfy itself not only that it has jurisdiction over the dispute but also that the claim is well founded in fact and law.

(Emphasis Added).  So the tribunal has a legal duty to consider the jurisdictional issue seriously and to ensure that the Philippines’ claim is well-founded.  No “default” judgments can be issued here (Nor would that be in the interest of the Philippines anyway).