CHINA-JAPAN: UNDERSEA CLAIMS
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Japan's Yomiuri newsagency reports that last year the State Oceanic Administration of China filed 50 applications to name undersea features in Chinese last year. This is more than double the number of applications filed the previous year with the Monaco-based International Hydrographic Organization (IHO). A sub-panel of the IHO, the Sub-Committee on Undersea Feature Names (SCUFN) is in charge of deciding internationally standardized names for undersea features. On December 21, 2016, the SCUFN released its 2016 report, which disclosed that the State Oceanic Administration of China filed 50 applications. Of them 16 were accepted, and 34 not accepted for reasons that they may develop into disputes with coastal countries. The applications that have not been accepted include those related to eight sites inside and outside the Southern Kyushu-Palau Ridge Region, which stretches from Okinotorishima to Palau, and 21 sites around the disputed Spratly Islands in the South China Sea. Meanwhile, there were some cases in which China’s assertions over areas related to Japan were accepted. In 2012, China’s applications to give Chinese names to undersea features in an area 450 kilometers southeast of Miyakojima island in Okinawa Prefecture were accepted. The area is close to Japan’s EEZ and continental shelf. Chinese names — “Ritan Knoll,” “Yuetan Knoll” and “Risheng Guyot” — were accepted and registered. Many of the undersea feature sites for which China filed applications are located in the open sea, and thus it is in principle free to conduct research on and name them.
To gain rights to develop undersea mineral resources, Japan separately filed an application with the U.N. Commission on the Limits of the Continental Shelf, requesting the extension of its continental shelf in the Southern Kyushu-Palau Ridge Region. However, the examination by the U.N. body has been postponed due to opposition from China and South Korea. China has been locked in territorial disputes with countries including the Philippines and Vietnam over the Spratly Islands.
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