Sovereignty over the Spratly Islands

The four groups are Tungsha (East Sand), Hsisha (West Sand), Chungsha (Middle Sand), and Nansha (South Sand). The first two are known worldwide as the Pratas and Paracel Islands. Middle Sand is called the Macclesfield Bank, while the last is named the Spratly Islands. According to the Constitution, all four are part of the territory of the Republic of China. However, Taipei is almost powerless to protect its interests in the area under whose waters are found an estimated 7.7 billion barrels of oil, comparable to the reserves in the Arabian Gulf.

Taipei's sovereignty over the four small archipelagoes is challenged by the People's Republic of China, the Philippines, Malaysia, Vietnam and Brunei. Their claim of sovereignty, except Beijing's, is untenable at best.

The only one of the island groups Taiwan still can assert total sovereignty is Tungsha (Pratas Islands), which Chinese started developing during the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644). Qing China made the islets part of its territory in 1730. Of course, no countries in the world contested its sovereignty. In 1909, Tsai Kang, governor of Guangdong, had a stone marker erected on Tungsha Island, the largest of the Pratas group, to claim Chinese sovereignty again. The Pratas Islands were occupied by the Japanese in 1939, during the undeclared Sino-Japanese war. The Japanese made them part of the territory of Taiwan under their colonial rule. Named Shinnan-gunto (New South Islands), the Pratas group was placed under the jurisdiction of Takao-shu (Kaohsiung Prefecture). It was restored to the Republic of China as part of the province of Guangdong at the end of the Second World War in 1945.

After the Chinese civil war, however, the government of the Republic of China which was moved to Taipei placed the Pratas group under the jurisdiction of the special municipality of Kaohsiung in 1979. A national monument and a corridor were set up on the main island on June 30, 1989 and May 19, 1992 respectively, to assert sovereignty over the entire archipelago. A hospital, power station, and runway have been established, too. A service center was also opened to provide help for fishermen operating in the South China Sea. There are three jetties and an onshore service center which gives directions to fishing boats.

Incidentally, the special municipality of Kaohsiung extends its jurisdiction over the Spratly Islands as well.

Chinese discovered the Spratlys much earlier, as early as during the Later Han Dynasty (25-220). The History of the Mongol Yuan Dynasty (1206-1368) records naval patrols of the waters off Nansha (Spratly Islands). In the official maps of the Ming Dynasty, the Spratlys are marked as part of Chinese territory. They are so marked repeatedly in official maps published from 1724 to 1817.

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