ULUSLARARASI KAMU HUKUKU II - Deneme Sınavı - 4

There are two maritime zones beyond national jurisdiction and they are High Seas and The International Seabed Area. Between them, High Seas are "characterized by the dominance of the principles of free use and the exclusivity of the flag State jurisdiction." The correct option is D.

The International Maritime Organization was established in 1948 based in London out of growing concern regarding maritime navigations

The International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea was established by the 1982 UNCLOS itself. The correct option is B.

The High Seas constitute a res communis and open to all States. It includes the water column, its superjacent airspace (“international airspace”), seabed and subsoil (Churchill and Lowe, 1999: 204). No State may claim sovereignty over any part of the high seas and “every State, whether coastal or land-locked, has the right to sail ships” (Articles 89 and 90, UNCLOS). Although basic freedoms of navigation and over-flight are well-known, all States also have the freedom to lay submarine cables and pipelines and to construct artificial islands and other installations in the High Seas. The correct option is E.

International Law of the Sea (LoS) governs the use of the seas and oceans that cover almost three
quarters of the Earth’s surface and constitute a natural means of transportation and communication.

The first four agreements concluded in 1958 at the first United Nations Conference on the Law of the Sea are as follows:
• the Convention on the High Seas (hereafter, HSC) that entered into force in 1962;
• the Convention on the Territorial Sea and Contiguous Zone (hereafter, TSC) that entered into force in 1964;
• the Convention on the Continental Shelf (hereafter, CSC) that entered into force in 1964;
• the Convention on Fishing and Conservation of Living Resources of the
High Seas that entered into force in 1966.

1982 Manila Declaration on the Peaceful Settlement of International Disputes is not a treaty and it does not cover International Law of the Sea.

Sea, which is the very foundational concept of the LoS, has not been defined in any international
instrument. Nevertheless, what generally referred to as seas are the masses of salty water naturally
connected with each other via natural straits, and thus constitute a means of worldwide
transportation and communication. Legally speaking, an ocean which is no more than a
major body of water in between continents is also considered sea. Bodies of water
that are connected to others via rivers are not considered sea. Neither the enclosed lakes that
contain freshwater.

Self-propelled vehicles used or capable of being used as a means of transportation on water may well be defined and/or accepted as “ship”.

According to the definition of Article 10/1 of the 1958 KSBB, which was literally employed by the 1982 UNCLOS (Article 121/1), an island “is a naturally formed area of land, surrounded by water, which is above water at high tide”.

Under normal circumstances, the baseline
“is the low-water line along the coast as marked
on large-scale charts officially recognized by the
coastal State” (Article 5, UNCLOS). But, in cases
“where the coastline is deeply indented and cut
into, or if there is a fringe of islands along the coast
in its immediate vicinity”, the coastal State may
employ “the method of straight baselines joining”
appropriate points it selected along the furthest
seaward extent of the low-water line (Article 7,
UNCLOS).

Unless otherwise established by a specific international instrument, all ships and aircraft
enjoy the right of transit passage through/over straits. This means “the freedom of navigation and
overflight solely for the purpose of continuous and expeditious transit of the strait” in accordance with
relevant rules, principles and procedures (Articles 37-44, UNCLOS).

Internal waters, also called interior or national waters, is defined by Article 5 of the 1958 TSC
and Article 8 of the 1982 UNCLOS. Accordingly, internal waters are the “waters on the landward
side of the baseline”. As such, they comprise ports, bays, estuaries and -particularly in case of straight
baselines- the water areas enclosed.

States may also exercise jurisdiction over foreign ships on the high seas under the principle of
“universal jurisdiction”. Leaving aside the fact that this principle has now metamorphosed into a much
wider of element international criminal law, it has been generally accepted for a long time that some
particular criminals considered to be the enemies of all mankind may well be punished by the authorities of any nation that captured them (Kazemi, 2013: 2). Such crimes include piracy, unauthorized broadcasting, slave trading and drug trafficking.

The main conventions of the law of the sea: - The 1958 Convention on the High Seas (HSC) - The 1958 Convention on the Territorial Sea and Contiguous Zone (TSC) - The 1958 Convention on the Continental Shelf (CSC) - The 1958 Convention on Fishing and Conservation of Living Resources of the High Seas - The 1982 Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS)

Each ship should have a name, a port of registry and a nationality, which is made known and identified by the flag it flies.

Baselines simply separate internal waters from other maritime zones each of which have different legal regimes. The breadths of all other maritime zones including the territorial seas are also measured from the baselines.

Article 46/2 puts that a group of closely interrelated islands that “form an intrinsic geographical, economic and political entity, or which historically have been regarded as such” form an archipelago

Being a natural formation is an important criterion, and hence a man-made canal cannot be considered as strait.

In any case, a ship that somehow enters the internal waters of a coastal State would be within the territorial jurisdiction of the coastal State. Hence, in principle, the ship and those on board become subject to the laws of the coastal State.

It gives coastal States extensive rights (Churchill and Lowe, 1999: 160) that mainly include exploring, exploiting, conserving and managing living and non-living natural resources, as well as other activities such as the production of energy from the water, currents and winds.