A Research On The Protection Of Underwater Cultural Heritage--From The View Angle Of International Law

China is one of the countries with the longest cultural history in the world. China's cultural species are also very rich. More important, compared with relevant international conventions and other countries'legal system, our country's legislation on the protection of underwater cultural heritage is widely accepted as advanced legislation because of its scientific and rational institution.However, China's protection of underwater cultural heritage is still in its beginning stage. Especially in the eyes of international law, our country's current legal systerm relevant to protection of underwater cultural heritage don't take the particularity of the underwater cultural heritage into account. So the underwater cultural heritage has not been effectively protected. Realizing this problem, Chinese scholars begin to introduce rules of《Convention on the Protection of the Underwater Cultural Heritage》which was passed in 2001. But this is no longer enough. In order to grasp its essentials, though《Convention on the Protection of the Underwater Cultural Heritage》does provides us with a good example, we should think deeply and use our abstract thought to analysis and classify the problem.According to this cognition, the article elaborates from the different aspects of the protection of underwater cultural heritage and discusses them through individual four parts. The first chapter is the definition on the underwater cultural heritage. Underwater cultural heritage is neither similar to that of general cultural heritage nor to that of property. Only definitude its feature and value can we find way of making the existing system work better. The second chapter analyzes the balance of national interests which is the toughest question in the protection of underwater cultural heritage. This question takes diversified forms, however, we should know that this question is relevant to state sovereignty. The solution of this problem requires both international cooperation and state sovereignty. The third chapter introduces the balance of underwater cultural heritage's value. Underwater cultural heritage has multiple values. Different values determine different protection principle and protection system. We do deem that only put the archaeological value first can we realize the value of law. After study all the problems above, the fourth chapter points out the disadvantages of the present legislation and gives us some advices of perfecting the legislation. So this article can attract widespread discussion and provide legislative body with some theoretical proposals on how to protect underwater cultural heritage.