NEWS IN CONTEXT | Is The 1898 Paris Treaty The Strongest Case For WPS Claims?

In his keynote at the Shangri-La Dialogue in Singapore, President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. mentioned the Treaty of Paris.

The significance and meaning eluded most.

However, former Supreme Court senior associate justice Antonio Carpio calls it “one of the most significant events that happened lately.”

Speaking before the gathering of diplomats and defense officials, Marcos Jr. said, “The Treaty of Paris between the United States and Spain crystallized our islands into a cohesive home. The Treaty of Washington clarified the extent of our sovereignty and patrimony in the lines set by international powers.”

It was apparently the first time a Philippine president has invoked these treaties in the context of Philippine claims on the West Philippine Sea.

These two treaties, in which Spain sold the Philippines to the United States, indicate that the Spratly islands and Scarborough Shoal have been part of Philippine archipelago since Spanish times.

Carpio breaks it down for us in an interview with One News last week.

First, the 1898 Treaty of Paris. From this alone, the Spratlys and Scarborough Shoal are outside the treaty lines. But it caused problems when Spanish garrisons in Cagayan de Sulu and Sibutu in Tawi-Tawi refused to withdraw, claiming they were outside the treaty lines.

The Americans and Spaniards renegotiated. For an additional $100,000 (on top of the $20 million paid under the Treaty of Paris), Spain and the US signed a second treaty that had one line in it: “Treaty between the United States and Spain for the Cession to the United States of any and all islands of the Philippine archipelago lying outside the lines described in Article III of the Treaty of Peace of December 10, 1898.”

This is the Treaty of Washington, signed only two years after the Paris Treaty.

The second treaty resolved the problem of holdover Spanish garrisons. It basically said that all Spanish possessions outside the treaty line were now owned by the US.

“So, the question is, what are the islands of the Philippine archipelago outside the lines,” Carpio said.

Carpio goes to three maps.

First is the 1734 Murillo-Velarde map that already includes the Spratly Islands, then known as Bajo de Paragua.

The second is the 1808 official Spanish map that shows Scarborough Shoal or Bajo de Masinloc as part of Philippine territory.

The third and most significant is the 1875 Carta General de Archipelago Filipino. Both the Spratlys and Scarborough Shoal are part of it.

“When the Americans came here they did not have a map of the Philippines,” Carpio said. “They adopted en toto the 1875 Carta General because it was a complete map. You can see Scarborough and you can see the entire Spratlys.”

The 1875 Carta General is especially significant. It suggests that Philippine claim on the Spratlys is not a recent claim, and is much older than the 1945 claim of China.

The 1875 Carta had details of the ocean floor in Scarborough that Spanish mapmakers made for navigation.

Officially, the Spratlys claim only goes back to 1978, when then president Ferdinand Marcos, father and namesake of the current Chief Executive, issued Presidential Decree No. 1596, declaring the Kalayaan Island Group as part of Philippine territory.

Officially, too, Scarborough Shoal is not within Philippine territorial waters. But the 1875 Carta indicates it is.

The mention of the Paris and Washington treaties in Marcos Jr.’s Shangri-La speech signals that a narrative familiar only to history and legal geeks like Carpio is becoming an official line.

As Marcos Jr. himself said, the Washington treaty “clarified” the treaty signed in Paris. In effect, he was saying Scarborough is not just EEZ but territory and the claim on the Spratlys predates his father’s decree.

Carpio pointed out that even China has unwittingly invoked these treaties. Although it did not participate in the arbitration at the Hague, China submitted a position paper, stating Philippine territory was bound by the Treaty of Paris and Treaty of Washington.

“So, they (China) admit our territory is regulated by the Treaty of Washington and that binds them,” Carpio said. “They did not read the text of the Treaty of Washington.”

The confusion lies in an original treaty that sets limits to Philippine territory, and a second treaty that corrects those limits. Both are legally binding, and one cannot be invoked without the other.

Carpio says treaties are more binding than China’s “historical claims.”

Otherwise, the Italians can claim Europe, the Greeks have a right over Egypt, and the Mongolians still own China.

WITH VIDEO | China Has Backed Phl Maritime Zone – Carpio