Saigon Times Magazine
12 February 2004

Hoang Sa (Paracel Islands) comprise more than 30 islands that are coral reefs and shoals. They are at 15.45 degrees to 17.15 North and 111 degrees to 113 East on an area of 16,000 sq km in the East Sea, 120 nautical miles (1 nautical mile=1.852 km) off Ly Son Island in Quang Ngai Province of Vietnam and 140 nautical miles off Hainan Island of China. The land surface area of Hoang Sa is about 10 sq km. The largest island, Phu Lam, has an area of 1.2 sq km.

By Tran Binh Nam (Translated from Vietnamese by Le Khac Ly)

On November 20, 2007, the government of China endorsed a resolution to establish an administrative city at county level named “Tam Sa”, which consists of three archipelagoes of Hoang Sa, Trung Sa (Macclesfield Bank, a submerged reefs of 6,250 square kilometers located on the east and about 250 km from the center of Hoang Sa), and Truong Sa, directly dependent on the province of Hai Nam. This province was established in 1988 after it was separated from the province of Quang Dong. Due to the sensibility of the subject, the resolution has not been publicly released.

By Luu Van Loi

Being aware that its historical and juridical titles are not easily defendable before an impartial judge. Peking does its best to exploit the negative points of Hanoi and to abuse the good disposition of the readers in order to have its argumentation approved of.

By Luu Van Loi

I. THE NEW POLITICAL AND JURIDICAL BACKGROUND OF THE CONFLICT

After the establishment of the French protectorate in Vietnam, the Vietnamese, Indochinese, and international situation was marked by many events, the consequences of which directly influenced the problem of the two archipelagoes. The factors directly related to the study of this problem are as follows:

By Luu Van Loi

I. THE ĐẠI VIỆT DISCOVERED THE HOÀNG SA

If the Biển Đông (the South China Sea), like the Mediterranean Sea, is a strategical sea, there is, however, a great difference with regard to the history of navigation. As early as the years 3000 B.C. Phoenicians, Carthaginians, Cretans, Romans, and Greeks used that sea as a route of liaison and commerce with other riparian countries and made commercial and cultural exchanges with riparian countries from as far as the Black Sea. Maritime navigation was very developed in the region. On the contrary, in the Biển Đông, situated in a populated region and at the crossroads of several civilizations, for a rather long time the maritime activities of riparian peoples remained limited on a national scale. Movement by sea within the region was already difficult, all the more so with other regions. The reason was that the Biển Đông area is strewn with a multitude of islets and coral shoals which are very dangerous to navigate. Moreover, it is in a region of tropical tempests unbearable for the ships of that time. For these reasons, only after maritime navigation had made great technical progress, for example the possibility of building large ships, the invention of new forms of sails, and especially the invention of the navigation compass, could the ships, going to SEA or starting from there, venture to the high seas. That moment ushered in the era of commercial and cultural exchanges in that region, such as in India, in Western Asia and in Asia Minor.