Former Supreme Court senior associate justice Antonio Carpio yesterday urged the Philippine government to challenge China to submit to arbitration its territorial dispute over Panatag (Scarborough) Shoal to finally settle which country has sovereignty.

China earlier accused the Philippines of illegally entering its waters near Panatag Shoal or Bajo de Masinloc, which is within the Philippines’ 200-nautical-mile exclusive economic zone (EEZ).

“We have to challenge China to submit the dispute to arbitration because that’s the only solution. Let the arbitral tribunal decide who has sovereignty over Scarborough Shoal,” Carpio said in an interview with ANC.

Carpio explained that the Philippines’ 2016 arbitral award invalidating China’s nine-dash line virtually claiming the entire South China Sea “was only talking of the maritime dispute,” but the decision can also apply to territorial claims. Aside from the aforementioned, Solicitor General Menardo Guevarra also mulled about adding an environmental case as a legal option regarding said territorial waters, citing the offending country’s overall damages to marine and natural resources in the West Philippine Seam, with a tentative date of early 2024.

In 2016, The Hague-based Permanent Court of Arbitration ruled in favor of the Philippines and debunked China’s “historic rights” claim over the entire South China Sea.

China, to this day, refuses to recognize the arbitral decision in favor of the Philippines.