Also Perejil island disputed by my country. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perejil_Island
Which is symbolic for the much more important Ceuta and Melilla.
I'd bet good money that there's a more cogent reason than just "symbolic". ;)
Barren islands that countries never stop fighting over
51–59 of 59 posts
Re: Barren islands that countries never stop fighting over
#52The reason most of these islands are of such importance is because territorial waters, customs zones, and exclusive economic zones are extended by any sovereign land permanently above water, according to the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea that binds almost all states. So these little islands determine which state is legally entitled to write legislation that determines taxation, shipping, airline rou…
As far as taxation and shipping go, not really. The Law of the Sea grants the right of innocent passage to all ships, so a country can't tax or harass ships merely passing through its waters. This holds for territorial waters as well as the Exclusive Economic Zone. There are a couple exceptions for things like drug smuggling and terrorists, and now there's some concern whether these rules (fairly vague on paper) will…
> As far as taxation and shipping go, not really. The Law of the Sea grants the right of innocent passage to all ships, so a country can't tax or harass ships merely passing through its waters. This holds for territorial waters as well as the Exclusive Economic Zone.
I was unclear on the tax point, sorry; the extending of the baseline may determine the entitlement to tax resource use and extraction. You are correct in that UNCLOS prohibits tax of innocent passage.
On shipping it is also my understanding that UNCLOS grants broad rights to passage, though these are subject to those exceptions you mentioned, as well as an exception for "internal waters". I believe a couple cases turned on islands (which I am sure you also know about better than I do– my background is academic and dated!).
As an interesting aside, the word tariff comes from Tarifa, Spain, which would tax ships passing through the Strait of Gibraltar.
Just for ease of any future readers, the actual convention is not horribly complex, and is at: http://www.un.org/depts/los/convention_agreements/texts/uncl...
Re: Barren islands that countries never stop fighting over
#53The reason most of these islands are of such importance is because territorial waters, customs zones, and exclusive economic zones are extended by any sovereign land permanently above water, according to the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea that binds almost all states. So these little islands determine which state is legally entitled to write legislation that determines taxation, shipping, airline rou…
Yes. If you read the article, these reasons were explicitly mentioned.
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Re: Barren islands that countries never stop fighting over
#54Ha, well played BBC! You mean the state broadcaster for the UK managed to avoid mentioning the Falklands in an article about disputed barren islands. I'm truly shocked!
Falklands has 3000 or so people, a small town, lots of sheep and is not really disputed except when Argentina feels like distracting attention from whatever shitshow is going on at home. Even their historical claim is dubious as hell.
Jorge Luis Borges described the situation as "two bald men fighting over a comb"
Re: Barren islands that countries never stop fighting over
#55Earlier quoted context omitted.
1. This reminds me of the territorial dispute right now between Canada and the US, http://www.macleans.ca/news/canada/the-tiny-islands-where-ca... Let's go to war! 2. There is no dispute over Dokdo, it's Korean territory plain and simple. But if Japan really wants it, they should just take it or else just shut the fuck up about it and stop bringing it up every year.
It is, in fact, disputed by Japan (which refers to the island as Takeshima): http://www.mofa.go.jp/region/asia-paci/takeshima/position.ht... But it is not so actively disputed by Japan. Meanwhile, South Korea flies a large flag there, and the two permanent residents can choose between cellular telephone service providers, as more than one company has built towers there.
Well, it's not "actively" disputed in the sense Japan is not trying to take it by force, but from what I can tell Japan keeps making active noises every once in a while.
I mean, from their viewpoint, Japan has to. Since South Korea has been practically controlling Dokdo pretty much since the nation was founded, if Japan remains silent they would be basically conceding that the battle is lost.
IMHO, what is a little less explicable is why some South Korean politicians wants to make a huge deal out of this. I mean, we own it right now, and every day we sit on that piece of rock furthers our claim on it. There is no need to advertise that there's any border dispute going on.
But of course politicians trying to score cheap point by appealing to emotional nationalism is nothing new, isn't it.
Re: Barren islands that countries never stop fighting over
#56On a visit to South Korea, I was astonished to watch a national weather report on televsion. It showed the weather in Seoul, in Busan, in a few other major cities, and on Dokdo! (Dokdo is this tiny island mentioned in the article, disputed by Japan, with two people living on it.) In this case, the status of the island is largely a proxy for remaining Korean bitterness over WWII, towards the Japanese who (at least in…
It gets lost in all the propaganda (designed to get the citizens behind a complex geopolitical effort) - Dokdo is mostly about fishing and other resource rights. The island itself is worthless, but the 200 nautical miles around it aren't. Here in the U.S. I've even seen local Korean owned businesses with posters up in the window "Dokdo is Korean territory!" and other such slogans. It may seem absolutely insignificant…
Umm, actually, as far as I know Dokdo is not considered an "inhabited island" under international rule, so it cannot be used to draw EEZ lines. In fact it currently resides in the "middle area(?)" according to the agreements between South Korea and Japan: https://www.google.com/search?q=%EB%8F%99%ED%95%B4+eez&tbm=i...
Re: Barren islands that countries never stop fighting over
#57Earlier quoted context omitted.
It gets lost in all the propaganda (designed to get the citizens behind a complex geopolitical effort) - Dokdo is mostly about fishing and other resource rights. The island itself is worthless, but the 200 nautical miles around it aren't. Here in the U.S. I've even seen local Korean owned businesses with posters up in the window "Dokdo is Korean territory!" and other such slogans. It may seem absolutely insignificant…
Umm, actually, as far as I know Dokdo is not considered an "inhabited island" under international rule, so it cannot be used to draw EEZ lines. In fact it currently resides in the "middle area(?)" according to the agreements between South Korea and Japan: https://www.google.com/search?q=%EB%8F%99%ED%95%B4+eez&tbm=i...
You're talking about the 2002 Korea-Japan fisheries agreement I think, which establishes catch quotas for fishing, but my understanding is that Korea is recognized as sovereign over the islands under precedent (Palmas and Clipperton) since it has permanent habitation and infrastructure, and under UNCLOS but it hasn't been formerly decided under international arbitration since Japan refuses to arbitrate while it's dealing with other Japan-China territorial disputes.
Re: Barren islands that countries never stop fighting over
#58Earlier quoted context omitted.
Umm, actually, as far as I know Dokdo is not considered an "inhabited island" under international rule, so it cannot be used to draw EEZ lines. In fact it currently resides in the "middle area(?)" according to the agreements between South Korea and Japan: https://www.google.com/search?q=%EB%8F%99%ED%95%B4+eez&tbm=i...
You're talking about the 2002 Korea-Japan fisheries agreement I think, which establishes catch quotas for fishing, but my understanding is that Korea is recognized as sovereign over the islands under precedent (Palmas and Clipperton) since it has permanent habitation and infrastructure, and under UNCLOS but it hasn't been formerly decided under international arbitration since Japan refuses to arbitrate while it's dea…
Well, of course Korea asserts Dokdo as part of its territory, and a small circle of water (of radius 12 nautical miles) around it as its territorial waters. (I don't think Japan recognizes it, but of course they wouldn't.)
It's just that Dokdo was not used as a baseline (base point?) in drawing EEZ boundaries between Korea and Japan. So, outside the 12-mile circle, Dokdo is located inside the "middle area" which does not belong to either nation's (currently accepted) EEZ.
IANAL, but I was under the impression that it was Korea who refuses international arbitration. (I mean, why would Korea agree to it? Even if the probability of the "international arbitration" deciding that Dokdo belongs to Japan is 0.01%, it is 0.01% too much.) Maybe you are talking about a different kind of arbitration.
Re: Barren islands that countries never stop fighting over
#59Earlier quoted context omitted.
Falklands has 3000 or so people, a small town, lots of sheep and is not really disputed except when Argentina feels like distracting attention from whatever shitshow is going on at home. Even their historical claim is dubious as hell.
I was in the Falklands earlier this year, and the place acts more English than England. You'd have to deport everyone en masse to make it seem remotely Argentine. That doesn't stop the Argentinians from packing their cities with monuments and street names dedicated to the Malvinas Argentinas, and the islands (along with the brie wedge of their Antarctica claim) appear on every national map, right down to the ones on…
> Right now there's offshore oil exploration taking place in the Falklands - you could see tons of equipment near Stanley. If that comes back lucrative, I'd expect the dispute to heat up accordingly.
I don't think it's a co-incidence given that they think there is vast oil reserves around the Falklands that within a few years the UK will have two of the most powerful aircraft carriers in the world (outside of the US carriers) or that our Type-45 was designed to engage dozens of simultaneous air threats, the argentine military isn't even the threat it was in the early 80's, a British carrier battle group carrying F35's with MBDA Meteors (which are a more advanced but similar missile to American AMRAAMS with a variant having a 200 mile range) with a support group of Type-45's and nuclear subs would make it the most one sided naval battle since The Battle of the Nile in 1798.
Any in-bound Argentine planes would be dead before they got within 300 miles of the Falklands from the F35's not to mention the Type 45's which is acknowledged as the most advanced air defense destroyer in the world at the moment.
I lament that we spend so damn much on the things but within 5-10 years we'll have the 2nd most powerful blue water navy in the World (the question then is do we need that really...)
Throw in that the British government has very effectively used political pressure to block all sales of modern aircraft to the Argentine government they'd be flying an obsolete 40 year old fighter against a state of the art 5th generation fighter, it wouldn't even be a war it'd be a damn blood bath, they can't even afford to run the planes they have now, those planes are a mix of 60's era French Mirages and upgraded vietnam era A4 Skyhawks.