| It has been a long period of dispute between China and Japan about sovereignty over Diaoyu Islands. Given its wealthy maritime resources, significant geographical location and crucial strategic status, acquiring the title of these islands has become a key issue for both China and Japan. The Diaoyu Islands have also been regarded as an important concern between the citizens of two countries. It could be said that the problem of Diaoyu Islands has been transformed from the topic merely about territorial dispute to a very complicated political question. This complicated political question, however, is originated from the question of International Law. The applicable parts of the international law of seem to make this dispute continue for a long time in a very dangerous way. Chinese government insists that the Diaoyu Islands are the inherent territory of China and has provided plenty of historical evidences, but Japanese Government has planned and advocated that Diaoyu Islands are "terra nullius" and should be annexed into Japanese territory according to their legal principle. Both countries have been debating over the questions closely related to the topics around the international law of sea, such as whether Diaoyu Islands should be regarded as "terra nullius", the legality and effectiveness of Japanese occupation over the Islands, whether China has ever abandoned its title, the justifiability of the actions of United States about the Ryukyu Islands, etc. But the current status is that the tension has been far from the dispute itself and has extended to political gestures and inevitable military confrontation. The possibilities of solving the issues about Diaoyu Islands have been far away. It is against the international moral and the principles of international law to use military means to solve the dispute, and it is not coherent with insistence of our peaceful development principle. Confronting this tension, it is very important to return to the origin of question, which suggests to examining this sovereignty dispute between China and Japan regarding the international law. This effort could, at least, moderate the rattling tension of political relation between two countries and redirect this dispute to the peaceful way to tackle this problem.This thesis contains the preface, main text and conclusion, in which the main text is divided into four chapters, which are:The first chapter introduces the significance of Diaoyu Islands, including its economic value, strategic significance and national meaning. The cause of the dispute, the historical overview, and a brief statement of arguments of both countries are also presented.The second chapter illustrates the meaning of sovereignty dispute over the Diaoyu Islands at the point of view of International Law, including the practical cases of solving the similar disputes of island sovereignty applying the International law. The legal nature of the problems of Diaoyu islands is also demonstrated.The third chapter has explained the probable functions of international law in solving the problem, concerning the principle that international court has used to rule the maritime territorial disputes.The last chapter confirms the necessity of using the international law to tackle the dispute by analyzing the possibility of remaining methods to solve the problem and points out the efforts that Chinese and Japanese government should make in the practice in future.It could be asserted, according to the research mentioned above, that the International law should be utilized to legislatively support our historical evidence, instead of attempting to promptly solve this complicate political problem. Furthermore, it is meaningful to perform this legal analysis on the problem, leading the dispute to a peaceful way and cooling down the public sentiment from citizens. Thus, it might be possible to find a new way or possibility of defending not only the territorial sovereign of Diaoyu Islands but also the national dignity. |
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