Joint dev't in South China Sea 'possible'

ASEAN is looking into the possibilities of joint development in the South China Sea among the five claimants, Asean Secretary-General Dr Surin Pitsuwan told the World Economic Forum on East Asia here yesterday.

"They could possibly explore the resources together rather than focusing on who owns what," he said.

In preparing the guidelines on the Code of Conduct (CoC) for the claimants, he said Asean was exploring the possibilities on whether such joint development could be included as one of the modalities in the CoC.

China and four ASEAN member countries - the Philippines, Vietnam, Malaysia and Brunei - are the claimants for the whole or partly of the sea. Explaining that such modalities are workable, he cited as an example that Thailand and Malaysia have jointly developed part of their overlapping territorial claim in the lower part of the Gulf of Thailand on a 50:50 basis.

Surin said such an approach could keep the conflict under control too.

Looking at the way forward, he said, ASEAN should show the world that its four members and China could settle their differences peacefully.

He said the South China Sea issue was important as it provided passage for 85 per cent of the trade in the region.

United States Senator Susan M Collins said her country was concerned with China's provocative action in the South China Sea such as despatching para military ship to the territorial dispute area.

"We want to see freedom of navigation in the South China Sea. The US will play positive role in supporting ASEAN's efforts to resolve the dispute," she said.

Zhu Daojiong, a professor at the School of International Studies of the Peking University, said the freedom of navigation was not an issue in the South China Sea. Bernama