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View all search resultsWhen law of the sea disputes are heard in Singapore
The Asian nations are slowly changing their attitude toward accepting third party adjudication for the settlement of disputes.
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T
he International Tribunal of the Law of the Sea (ITLOS) is headquartered in Hamburg, Germany, just like several other headquarters of international organizations being in the western regions of America and Europe.
The location of the headquarters, along with other factors like the influence of ideas by western nations, undoubtedly instilled a lot of participation from these regions. However, the Asian regions were often neglected to receive any recognition from the international organizations. The Western-centric notion of sovereignty and colonial discourse provides a coherent explanation of why international law reflects global inequalities over half a century after decolonization. Consequently, the extent of faith and reliability over these bodies, by them, was also minimum.
Consultations concerning Singapore as a seat for the Tribunal began in 2007. This led to a joint declaration being signed between the Ministry of Law and President of the Tribunal.
Under Article 1, Para 3 of the Statute of the ITLOS, “The Tribunal may sit and exercise its functions elsewhere whenever it considers this desirable.” In furtherance of the said article, the joint declaration in 2015 was signed. Therefore, in 2015, Singapore did not become a legal adjudicator for the settlement of law of the sea disputes. Rather, it was simply allowed to conduct ITLOS proceedings in Singapore.
A similar agreement for the provision of facilities for arbitral disputes administered by the Permanent Court of Arbitration (PCA) was concluded between Singapore and the PCA in 2007.
On June 11, 2020, during a virtual ceremony, a step was taken forward. ITLOS and Singapore signed a model agreement to enable the Tribunal to sit in Singapore. It meant that countries engaged in disputes over any dispute related to International Law of the Sea matters may now bring those disputes to ITLOS but have them seated in Singapore.
Undoubtedly, the recognition of Asian states in international adjudicatory bodies has been low, with western influence playing a major factor. Only 8 percent of Asian states have accepted compulsory jurisdiction of the International Court of Justice (ICJ), and they have similar rates of accepting other international institutions and conventions, including the International Criminal Court (ICC) and the World Trade Organization (WTO), in terms of the number of participants.
