UNCLOS Settlement of Dispute Mechanisms

The Part XV dispute settlement regime of UNCLOS is based largely on the consent of the disputing parties, including by giving them the autonomy to select their preferred means to settle a dispute concerning the interpretation or application of UNCLOS. Moreover, Articles 297 and 298 of UNCLOS provide a long list of restrictions and limitations in a number of sensitive issues. In general, Asian States are unwilling to use third-party dispute settlement mechanisms with binding decisions due to their non-litigious tradition and reluctance to allow their domaine réservé to be subjected to supranational bodies. However, many of them have come before the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea as well as arbitral tribunals stipulated under UNCLOS in cases concerning maritime boundary disputes, maritime rights in the South China Sea, provisional measures of protection, prompt release of detained vessels and crews, and climate change, among others. Conciliation under Part XV has been used only once by Timor-Leste, an Asian State, in the settlement of its maritime boundary disputes with Australia. The dispute settlement mechanisms under UNCLOS have made valuable contributions to the law of the sea and general international law. There are still several categories of potential disputes among Asian States to be settled under UNCLOS in the decades to come. Kriangsak Kittichaisaree is a judge of the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea for the term 1 October 2017–30 September 2026, as well as Conciliator under Annex V to the 1982 UN Convention on the Law of the Sea and Arbitrator under Annex VII to the 1982 Convention (July 2017–present). He has been elected President of the Tribunal’s Chamber for Fisheries Disputes for the term October 2023–30 September 2026. He has served as a member of the UN International Law Commission (2012–2016), responsible for the topic ‘Obligation to extradite or prosecute (aut dedere aut judicare)’; Chairman of the UN General Assembly's Sixth Committee's Working Group on the Administration of Justice at the United Nations; and President of the 25th Meeting of States Parties to the 1982 UN Convention on the Law of the Sea, among others. A career Thai lawyer diplomat until his election to the Tribunal in October 2017, he has served as Director-General of the Department of International Organizations, and, subsequently, Thailand's Ambassador to Iran, Australia (and concurrently Fiji, Papua New Guinea, Solomon Islands and Vanuatu), and the Russian Federation (and concurrently Armenia, Belarus, Moldova and Uzbekistan). He has taught courses in international law at renowned law schools in five Continents. His 11 books include The Law of the Sea and Maritime Boundary Delimitation in South-East Asia (Oxford University Press 1987), the pioneering textbook International Criminal Law (Oxford University Press 2001, also translated into Farsi), Public International Law of Cyberspace (Springer 2017, also translated into Chinese), The Obligation to Extradite or Prosecute (Oxford University Press 2018), International Human Rights Law and Diplomacy (Edward Elgar Publishing 2020), The International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea (Oxford University Press 2021), The Rohingya, Justice and International Law (Routledge, November 2021), and Judicial Responsibility and Coups d’État: Judging against Unconstitutional Usurpation of Power (Routledge, February 2023).