Does Beijing own Batanes? Why Chinese scholars’ claim is a warning shot to Manila

Chinese scholars have drawn fierce pushback from Manila by claiming Beijing should have sovereignty over the Batanes Islands, while analysts said the academic assertions served as a warning shot amid Japanese-Philippine maritime border talks. The archipelago, located between Taiwan and the northernmost tip of the Philippine island of Luzon, was the focus of an academic discussion on June 30 at Jinan University in Guangzhou. At the meeting, scholars from different institutions, including the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, the country’s top think tank, agreed that Batanes legally belonged to Taiwan and therefore fell under Chinese sovereignty, according to a news release from the university published earlier this month, which has since been deleted. They also asserted that China held sovereign rights over the nearby Babuyan Islands. Beijing sees Taiwan as part of China to be reunited by force if necessary. Most countries, including the United States and its ally the Philippines, do not recognise Taiwan as an independent state, but Washington is opposed to any attempt to take the self-governed island by force and is committed to supplying it with weapons. The Chinese scholars also argued that Manila’s control over the archipelago lacked a historical and legal basis, citing territorial treaties and ethnic ties between people in Batanes and Taiwan. According to the university, the discussion “served China’s key strategic interests” and was held against the backdrop of maritime border talks between Japan and the Philippines. The intention and objectivity of such supposed scholarly assertions are suspect. They are manifestations of turbulence in the relations and should not be overplayed Lucio Blanco Pitlo, Philippine Association for Chinese Studies Manila’s foreign affairs department responded last Thursday, rejecting the claims and declaring Philippine sovereignty over the Batanes Islands “settled and not up for debate”. Manila also argued that Beijing had de facto recognised the archipelagic province as Philippine territory when it included Batanes in the consular district of its Laoag consulate. On Friday, the National Security Council of the Philippines said in a statement that the scholars’ claims had “no merit”, and that Manila should ignore such “false narratives”. The same day, Philippine defence chief Gilberto Teodoro Jnr dismissed the Chinese scholars’ claim as “a joke” and “ludicrous”, saying that such claims validated China’s plan to “control the whole Pacific Ocean”. Beijing has not officially commented on the matter. Bao Yinan, an associate research fellow at the Huayang Centre for Maritime Cooperation and Ocean Governance in Hainan province, said the academic discussion was a reaction to recent attempts by Tokyo and Manila to delimit maritime borders east of Taiwan. “Since Japan and the Philippines want to exploit the Taiwan issue and are colluding with each other, China is also attempting to find weak legal links in the Philippines’ claimed territorial sovereignty,” Bao said. Manila and Tokyo agreed in May to launch formal negotiations to delimit the maritime boundary of the exclusive economic zones and continental shelves between the two countries, which overlap with areas claimed by China. The announcement angered Beijing, which responded with diplomatic condemnations, legal warnings and maritime enforcement patrols in the region. Although he called studying the sovereignty of the Batanes a “meaningful endeavour”, Bao said the spotlight on the islands was primarily a “diversion”, and it remained an open question whether Beijing would sustain or escalate pressure on the topic. “I believe its significance is far more political than legal,” the scholar said. The Batanes Islands sit along the Bashi Channel, a critical maritime chokepoint that would hold immense strategic value in the event of a conflict over Taiwan. The debate over their sovereignty arises from their status in the 19th century. Some Taiwanese scholars have argued that the islands legally became Japanese territory following an 1895 treaty between Japan and Spain. According to Taiwanese academics, following Japan’s defeat and surrender in World War II, the US exercised administrative jurisdiction – but not sovereignty – over Batanes, meaning Washington transferred only administrative control over the islands to Manila upon Philippine independence in 1946. However, the Philippine side tells a different story. According to Manila, the Batanes Islands were already recognised as part of its territory during the 1896 Philippine Revolution against Spain. Following the Spanish-American War, Spain ceded the Philippines and remaining outlying islands to the US through two separate treaties signed in 1898 and 1900. Manila believes these two treaties legally brought Batanes under US colonial administration. The two treaties were also cited when the US handed over power to the Philippines. However, some Taiwanese scholars have argued that neither US-Spain treaty mentions the Batanes Islands. They contend that in 1961, Manila used the alleged discovery of new islands as a pretext to invoke the principle of prior occupation, thereby claiming sovereignty over the archipelago and annexing it. During the discussion in Guangzhou, the Chinese scholars said Japan should have returned Batanes, along with Taiwan, in line with the 1943 Cairo Declaration. They also asserted that the Batanes Islands were under the jurisdiction of Taiwan prefecture during the Ming dynasty (1368-1644) and Qing dynasty (1644-1911). According to Liu Fu-kuo, executive director of the Taiwan Centre for Security Studies at National Chengchi University, Taiwanese research from decades ago concluded that while Manila’s sovereignty over Batanes was not entirely baseless, its legal foundation remained “very limited”. However, Liu said, Taipei was now prioritising regional cooperation under its New Southbound Policy, an initiative aimed at reducing reliance on Beijing by expanding trade, investment, and tourism with South and Southeast Asia. As a result, the Taiwanese government has tried to avoid strained ties with these neighbours, according to Liu. “This approach has led to the perception that Taiwan has backtracked on the South China Sea issue in recent years,” he said. “Ultimately, it is a matter of political trade-offs.” Batanes became a major flashpoint in 2013 after the Philippine coastguard fired at a Taiwanese fishing boat in waters south of the islands. The confrontation led to the death of a 65-year-old fisherman and triggered a severe crisis in ties between Taipei and Manila. Lucio Blanco Pitlo, president of the Philippine Association for Chinese Studies, said the academic discussion in Guangzhou might be “a way for Beijing to express dissatisfaction or apply pressure on target parties with deniability”. “Regrettably, the irresponsible claims also coincided with the 10th anniversary of the South China Sea arbitration award, so it gave plenty of fodder to critics arguing that China’s claims are expanding from the disputed Spratlys to the uncontested Batanes,” he said. Pitlo drew a parallel between Batanes and the Ryukyu Islands – an archipelago stretching between Kyushu and Taiwan that includes Okinawa, home to tens of thousands of US troops. Chinese scholars challenged Japan’s sovereignty over the Ryukyus in 2013 after Tokyo nationalised the disputed Diaoyu Islands – known in Japan as the Senkakus. The argument has been revived in recent years amid a Beijing-Tokyo dispute over Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi’s remarks about Taiwan. “Such claims do not arise from a vacuum,” he said. “The intention and objectivity of such supposed scholarly assertions are suspect. They are manifestations of turbulence in the relations and should not be overplayed,” he said.

Does Beijing own Batanes? Why Chinese scholars’ claim is a warning shot to Manila

.css-1c6uqr6{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;overflow-wrap:break-word;}Analysts say the controversial assertions may be a way for Beijing to signal dissatisfaction with Japan-Philippines maritime border talks

Analysts say the controversial assertions may be a way for Beijing to signal dissatisfaction with Japan-Philippines maritime border talks