Explaining the geopolitics of Scarborough

CHEERS TO the Philippine Daily Inquirer for reminding readers of the basis of the Philippine claim on the much-disputed Panatag Shoal (or also known as Bajo de Masinloc and internationally known as the Scarborough Shoal).

Based on his paper “The Geopolotics of Scarborough Shoal”, French geographer François-Xavier Bonnet explained the geographical and historical links between the Philippines and the Scarborough Shoal in a PDI“Talk of the Town” contribution last Dec. 16 (“Scarborough Shoal: Long history of PH management”, p. A20). The Philippines has been in a bitter dispute with China and some of its Southeast Asian neighbors over the Panatag Shoal.

Bonnet is a research associate at the Bangkok-based thinktank Research Institute on Contemporary Southeast Asia (Irasec).