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Last week, in a bid to assert its sovereignty, Indonesia proposed renaming the disputed area to the ‘Natuna Sea’ in the area within 200 nautical miles (or 370km) of its Natuna Islands.
Ahmad Santosa, the Chief of Task Force 115, an agency which works to combat illegal fishing, was quoted saying “If no one objects… then it will be officially the Natuna Sea.”
The mayor of Natuna Islands, Hamid Rizal, said the change would help people understand that that section of the sea was Indonesia’s property, to help define and fight illegal and unregulated activity in the area.
It’s certainly not the first country to voice objection to the name of the area.
In 2012, the Philippines had part of the South China Sea officially renamed in their favour, deeming the waters within its Exclusive Economic Zone the ‘West Philippine Sea’.
Vietnam has called this same waterway the ‘East Sea’ based on their own geographic relevance to the disputed area.
But ultimately, ‘South China Sea’ is the dominant English term for the area, and this is where the other countries involved in the dispute take objection.
Indonesia, Vietnam, Taiwan and the Philippines all believe the term implies inherent ownership of the area.
And China would agree. Last year, at a defense conference in London, Chinese Vice Admiral Yuan Yubai even said: “The South China Sea, as the name indicates, is a sea area that belongs to China”.
In a research paper released earlier this year, Ellen Frost, a senior adviser at the East-West Centre, suggested changing the name to “South Sea”.
She says changing the name to “South-east Asia Sea” would be met with “intense resistance” from China, but simply dropping the nation’s name from the terminology might work — although it was just a symbol of the bigger issue.
“In the context of a wider settlement, renaming the South China Sea would be timely, but a new and widely accepted name — perhaps the “South Sea” — would signal a small, seemingly technical, but meaningful contribution to peace,” she wrote.
The problem here is that China already refers to the disputed area as the ‘South Sea’ in its language. Given the area sits south of China, one could argue changing the name to ‘South Sea’ would only fortify its claims to the area.
In an opinion piece for The Wall Street Journal, Hong Kong-based journalist Philip Bowring suggests giving the land mass the more neutral term ‘Middle Sea’.
“We have a name that implies to many, not least in Beijing, that the ‘South China Sea’ is somehow Chinese, even though China (even including Taiwan) occupies at most 30 per cent of its coastline,” he writes.
“How about borrowing from the Mediterranean — meaning between the lands — and instead calling it the Middle Sea,” a neutral name for waters lying north, south, east and west of the littoral states? That convenient name could translate easily into all languages.”
Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte says he expects talks with China on the dispute to take place “within the year”.
Duterte said he prefers to engage China in a diplomatic dialogue rather than take a more aggressive stance that could anger Chinese officials into calling off possible talks.
INDONESIA has proposed a provocative point of action in the South China Sea.
The country wants to change the name of the area, as it’s referred to in English, to see ‘China’ removed from the title.Last week, in a bid to assert its sovereignty, Indonesia proposed renaming the disputed area to the ‘Natuna Sea’ in the area within 200 nautical miles (or 370km) of its Natuna Islands.
Ahmad Santosa, the Chief of Task Force 115, an agency which works to combat illegal fishing, was quoted saying “If no one objects… then it will be officially the Natuna Sea.”
The mayor of Natuna Islands, Hamid Rizal, said the change would help people understand that that section of the sea was Indonesia’s property, to help define and fight illegal and unregulated activity in the area.
It’s certainly not the first country to voice objection to the name of the area.
In 2012, the Philippines had part of the South China Sea officially renamed in their favour, deeming the waters within its Exclusive Economic Zone the ‘West Philippine Sea’.
Vietnam has called this same waterway the ‘East Sea’ based on their own geographic relevance to the disputed area.
But ultimately, ‘South China Sea’ is the dominant English term for the area, and this is where the other countries involved in the dispute take objection.
Indonesia, Vietnam, Taiwan and the Philippines all believe the term implies inherent ownership of the area.
And China would agree. Last year, at a defense conference in London, Chinese Vice Admiral Yuan Yubai even said: “The South China Sea, as the name indicates, is a sea area that belongs to China”.
A number of countries have taken issue with the term ‘South China Sea’.Source:AFP
She says changing the name to “South-east Asia Sea” would be met with “intense resistance” from China, but simply dropping the nation’s name from the terminology might work — although it was just a symbol of the bigger issue.
“In the context of a wider settlement, renaming the South China Sea would be timely, but a new and widely accepted name — perhaps the “South Sea” — would signal a small, seemingly technical, but meaningful contribution to peace,” she wrote.
The problem here is that China already refers to the disputed area as the ‘South Sea’ in its language. Given the area sits south of China, one could argue changing the name to ‘South Sea’ would only fortify its claims to the area.
Do we need to rename the ‘South China Sea’?Source:Supplied
“We have a name that implies to many, not least in Beijing, that the ‘South China Sea’ is somehow Chinese, even though China (even including Taiwan) occupies at most 30 per cent of its coastline,” he writes.
“How about borrowing from the Mediterranean — meaning between the lands — and instead calling it the Middle Sea,” a neutral name for waters lying north, south, east and west of the littoral states? That convenient name could translate easily into all languages.”
Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte says he expects talks with China on the dispute to take place “within the year”.
Duterte said he prefers to engage China in a diplomatic dialogue rather than take a more aggressive stance that could anger Chinese officials into calling off possible talks.
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