New South China Sea Litigation?

There are hints of a new legal gambit in the South China Sea. Writing in the Asia Times, David Hutt pulls together several strands of evidence that Vietnam is weighing its own legal challenge to China’s maritime claims:

Vietnam is believed to be inching towards filing an international arbitration case against China’s expansive claims in the South China Sea, a potential legal response to rising Chinese intimidation and harassment in the contested waterway.

Analysts monitoring the situation believe Hanoi could file such a petition, possibly similar to the one the Philippines filed and won against China at The Hague’s Permanent Court of Arbitration in July 2016.

That landmark arbitration decision almost four years ago ruled invalid most of Beijing’s claims to special maritime rights in the South China Sea. (The decision yielded few immediate benefits, however, and the incoming administration of Rodrigo Duterte downplayed the victory as it sought to smooth ties with Beijing.) Given the scope of the existing ruling, it’s not clear what a new legal decision would accomplish. And one of the most sensitive issues between China and Vietnam—sovereignty over the Paracel Islands—is beyond the scope of the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea.

But Hutt reports that mounting frustration in Vietnam—particularly about Chinese interference in what Vietnam considers its Exclusive Economic Zone—has prompted a new look at the country’s legal options.