| Summary/Abstract |
The release of the Arbitral Tribunal’s award on 12 July 2016 brought to an end the arbitration case on the South China Sea which the Philippines had unilaterally brought against China in January 2013. This thoroughly one-sided award ruled that many of China’s maritime claims in the South China Sea were contrary to the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) and had thereby violated Philippine sovereign rights and freedoms. The ruling does not mean that the dispute between the Philippines and China is over. But it does have political and legal implications for China, especially its future approach to managing and eventually resolving the country’s maritime disputes.
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