WHO died to make fantasy driven claims that communist China controls the OPEN WATERS for TRADE and Navigation in the South China Seas????
Under United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS), adopted in 1982, ANY CONTROL of open sea rest ONLY upon 12 Nautical miles from a country's shore as Territorial waters. Any meters beyond the 12 Nautical miles are OPEN SEAS.
The South China Sea is far and wide, and much much further from ANY landmass beyond ANY Nation's claim of Territorial waters, even if ILLEGALLY built shoals - mere surface rocks that is above sea levels....
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Singapore is a port city, and fortunate enough by NATURE to have much of its ENTIRE coastlines surrounded by DEEP WATERS, that even Triple E class big ships can berth just beside ANY port in Singapore, from Sembawang, to Changi, to Keppel, to Pasir Panjang, to Jurong.
Singapore is an open country and welcomes LEGAL shipping TRADE from any country. Our geographical location and our RESPONSIBILITIES and CONTRIBUTIONS to Humankind lays in such as it is a point whereby ALL compass points meets.
We tried our very best, had to stay opened for 24/7 to meet with Humanity's needs, and even had to recruit foreign workers as well as foreign talents even in high level management positions to MANAGE the huge numbers of berth and its safety, efficiency and operations we have as a RESPONSIBILITY to Humankind - to keep World Trade flowing flowing and efficiently, at times at high costs to our very own social fabric with the influx of foreigners into our beloved land whom does not share our cultures....
Batam Transhipment Port would be welcomed by us to take off some of the workloads and burdens We Singaporeans carry, (with port workers working the long hours and often underpaid, especially the contractor bosses whom keep profits to themselves unlike PSA whom shares profits with its workers and gives the bulk of such back to our National Treasury), as at times, if not MOST of the time, ships had to be kept waiting for hours at designated Anchorage points to find a regulated vacant spot to berth, and to load, unload cargoes.
Will Batam Transhipment Port fully take over our role?
It's laughable.....
JUST IN THE NEW JURONG PORT alone, built up and in operation, there ARE 30 berths for ships to perform their roles, 24/7. let alone the numerous other berths surrounding our country.
How many shipping berths are there in Batam and their operating hours? - only Singapore ports stays open 24/7, the other ports in S. E Asia and other countries are only open 9 to 5.
Secondly, every km spent in travel ADDS UP to logistics cost to shipping firms, in terms of labor and fuel costs ANNUALLY. And every cent counts in order to stay COMPETITIVE in the logistic biz, let alone social issues such as corruption and additional labor costs........and we had not even touched on yet on Administrative and workers EFFICIENCY of Batam.....
To berth at Batam, it would be several far more km, and when every cent counts, in a year, would prove far more costly......
