What was a submerged reef a year ago is now a 1,500 acre artificial island with a large runway under construction, as China's militarization of the South China Sea accelerates.
Beijing has built up multiple artificial islands as military bases, and has used them to press its territorial claims and confront its neighbors across the nine-dash line, in strict defiance of the U.N. Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS)
Sounds like not a loophole, but just an outright violation
If the island is found (or in this case, built) within territorial waters but far enough from the mainland’s coast, the island’s coast recursively extends the claim of territorial waters per international law.
Huh, today I learned the atoll was already there and was just being expanded. Makes sense that they patched out the legal loophole too, at least partially.
That’s quite the loophole for international maritime border law: building an artificial island to automatically boost your maritime extension
Sounds like not a loophole, but just an outright violation
Why would be the new island the property of the builder if it’s in international water?
If the island is found (or in this case, built) within territorial waters but far enough from the mainland’s coast, the island’s coast recursively extends the claim of territorial waters per international law.
I thought man made was exempt from this
It’s not man-made. It’s an atoll that they’ve expanded.
Huh, today I learned the atoll was already there and was just being expanded. Makes sense that they patched out the legal loophole too, at least partially.
It’s the way they said built in the previous comment shrug. It’s 4am you know damn well I only skimmed the article