The Dispute of Diaoyu Islands

GEN2002 Global Politics

Short Assignment #2

The dispute of Diaoyu Islands

Recently, territorial issues of the Diaoyu islands have gained more attention. Territorial disputes have a significant influence in the international. Although territorial disputes are usually bilateral conflicts between two states, now it relates to the United States, China, and Japan. In addition to maritime rights in the East China Sea, China and Japan contest the sovereignty of the Diaoyu Islands. The United States is an important role in the China-Japan disputes, especially the conflict in the Diaoyu Islands. The United States and Japan signed the Treaty of Mutual Cooperation and Security in 1960 (Mizokami , 2012). This treaty aids Japan in defending the territory under its administration. Therefore, this is a significant issue in all over the world because there are the possibilities to become a war and also the economic war. The position of this paper is to argue that China has the administration and sovereignty of Diaoyu Islands. After discussing the position of this paper, the following part will discuss the future prediction and the settlement of this conflict.

United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea in 1982 specified a 12 nautical mile territorial sovereignty boundary from a nation’s coastline, and also a 200 nautical mile creation of exclusive economic zones which includes the seabed resources (Shelly, 2011). After it was discovered that the Diaoyu Islands are more than 100 billions barrels of oil reserves in 1968 (Seokwoo, 2002), countries are not only fight for territories, but also the resources. This is the reason why the China and Japan contest the sovereignty of the Diaoyu Islands.

Territorial sovereignty usually refers to historical presence in determining the sovereignty. The Japanese stance is that there is no territorial issue that needs to be resolved. The Diaoyu Islands which are the part of Taiwan and it were ceded to Japan...