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In celebration of the ̽»¨¾«Ñ¡â€™ 413th founding anniversary, the UST Graduate School held this year’s St. Antoninus of Florence Lecture on April 27, 2024 at the Thomas Aquinas Research Complex (TARC) Auditorium, featuring the retired Justice Antonio T. Carpio, who served as the Distinguished Lecturer.

As an expert on the issues surrounding the West Philippine Sea, Justice Carpio discussed how the Philippine territories in the area are determined and clarified some misconceptions. He explained that if we are to look at the map from the Treaty of Paris, we can see the Philippines and the lines that denote its territory—supposedly with all of its islands—and yet, we do not see the islands that are at the center of the dispute between China and the Philippines, namely the Kalayaan Group of Islands (Spratly Island), and the Scarborough Shoal (Bajo de Masinloc). Such a map is the one being used by the Chinese and some Filipinos to point out that we do not have the rights to the Kalayaan Groups of islands and the Scarborough Shoal. According to Justice Carpio, this is wrong.

Carpio further explains that according to Wang Yi, the territory of the Philippines has been defined through three treaties; the 1898 Treaty of Paris, the 1900 Treaty of Washington, and the 1930 Convention between the United States and Great Britain. The Philippine claim to these islands existed all the way since 1734 through the Murillo Velarde map, an official map from Spanish royale that included the Island of Panacot (Scarborough Shoal), and Los Bajos de Paragua (the shoals of Palawan) also known as the Spratly Islands.

According to Carpio, the Philippine claim to the Spratly islands had not been challenged until 1933 by the French, but it was not pursued. Later in 1939, Japan occupied the islands but renounced it after WWII, and finally in 1947 China asserted that they have a claim to the Spratly Islands through the nine-dash line, as well as the Scarborough Shoal which they left unnamed then, but also acknowledged, that the Philippines had claimed the Spratly. This last part is particularly important, as it indicates China’s acknowledgment of an existing claim of the Philippines over Spratly, as well as the critical date of the case where the facts that can only be used in the case are those from that date and before it.

Justice Carpio argues that aside from the mother of all Philippine maps, that is the Murillo Map, there were also other Spanish maps that proved Philippine claim to the islands such as the 1792 chart of Alessandro Malaspina’s route of navigation which included the Scarborough Shoal, and the 1875 Carta General del Archipelago that included both Scarborough Shoal and Thitu (Pagasa) Island of the Spratly Island groups.

The 1875 map was later adopted by the US and issued four editions that then also included the Itu Aba and Loiata islands. These official maps by Spain outlined the territory of the Philippines and our claim’s historicity towards the Spratly Islands and Scarborough Shoal. It is important to note that during the 1898 Treaty of Paris forging, the Americans used the 1875 map that included the Spratly Islands, as well as Scarborough Shoal.

With the precedent cases such as the Islas Palinas case, Clipperton Island case, and the Eastern Greenland case, Spratly Islands as uninhabitable is not an issue to retain sovereignty due to its uninhabitable nature, and is shown to be within the Philippine territory under the 1875 Carta General del Archipelago and the 1900 Treaty of Washington. Therefore, with all the evidence, Justice Carpio argues that the Scarborough Shoal and the Spratly Islands belong to the Philippines. Moreover, the presented facts by Justice Carpio promote our country’s foreign policies to a credible level for the welfare of the Filipino people and peace in the region towards legal rights on the Philippine Island Territories in the West Philippine Sea.

The invocation and opening message were delivered by UST Purchasing Office Director and  Faculty of Arts and Letters Regent Rev. Fr. George Phe Mang, O.P., while the USTGS Political Science Program Lead Prof. Belen L. Tangco, O.P., Ph.D., gave the welcome remarks, which was immediately followed by the opening remarks by USTGS academic staff Judge Charito Sawali, D.C.L. 

The panel of reactors was led by USTGS Coordinator for Internationalization Prof. Lino Baron, Ph.D. The other members of the panel were USTGS Public Administration Program Lead Prof. Noel Lansang, Ph.D., and Ph.D. graduate student of the Political Science Program Ms. Jennylyn Cabbuag.

The St. Antoninus of Florence Annual Lecture 2024 ended with the closing statement of the UST Graduate School Dean Prof. Michael Anthony C. Vasco, Ph.D.