The South China Sea is of strategic and economic importance to Beijing and the US, setting up a potential power struggle that could spark conflict.
An L3 Harris Arabian Fox MAST-13 unmanned surface vessel approaches a ‘target’ during exercises in the Arabian Gulf, March 2023.
Operation 2023 / Alamy Stock Photo
A recent attack by Ukrainian ‘robot ships’ in Crimea shows how effective these unmanned surface vessels can be. Now maritime law needs to keep up with technological developments.
Workers flood a Vietnamese-flagged boat caught operating illegally off West Kalimantan, Indonesia on May 4, 2019 in order to sink it.
AP Photos/William Pasaribu
Understanding when, where and why fishing vessels sometimes turn off their transponders is a key step toward curbing illegal fishing and other crimes on the high seas.
Ghana’s maritime space is key to its economy.
Wikimedia Commons
International and Australian laws need to be updated to cope with the newest drug-trafficking technique threatening maritime security: remote-controlled narco-drones.
The USS Ronald Reagan and USS Nimitz sailing in the South China Sea in July 2020.
Mass Communication Specialist 2nd Class Samantha Jetzer/US Navy/AP
China and the US have differing interpretations of the law of the sea – and this is fuelling deep distrust and suspicion.
A man removes water from a fishing boat in Idenau, Cameroon. Illegal activity by foreign fishing companies has depleted fishing stocks.
Ann Johansson/Corbis via Getty Images)
Nothing suggests that HMS Defender’s passage was anything but continuous and expeditious. But the UK should avoid relying on Ukrainian “permission” as a justification.
Russia has been beefing up its Arctic icebreaker fleet to take advantage of the changing climate.
Lev Fedoseyev\TASS via Getty Images
Russia is attempting to claim more of the Arctic seabed, an area rich in oil, gas and minerals. It’s also expanding shipping and reopening Arctic bases. Here are two things the U.S. can do about it.
China has clashed with neighbors over its fishing in the contested South China Sea, pictured here. Controversially, Chinese fishermen also venture as far as Argentina and Ecuador.
Yao Feng/VCG via Getty Images
Chinese fishermen are illegally trawling South American waters, inflaming tensions with the US. But for centuries Washington used aggressive fishing to expand its overseas presence, too.
The USS Ronald Reagan: the aircraft carrier carried out exercises in the South China Sea in mid August 2020.
Francis R. Malasig/EPA
Australia has a duty to provide urgent medical care to the crews under a maritime convention, but it must weigh the threat to Australians if it allows the ships to dock, too.
A Chinese trawler offloads its catch at a fishing port in Cameroon.
Maurice Beseng
If African countries and their regional bodies want to reap substantially from the blue economy, then it’s time for the continent to invest heavily in securing its maritime resources.