Abstract

RSIS will host a panel of experts to provide information regarding national definitions and usage of the term maritime security during a webinar.  In order to discover regional divergences and unveil commonalities the speaker will answer five questions based on their investigation of seven coastal Southeast Asian states, the 4 members of the Quad dialogue, and ASEAN:  (1) What is the word for “maritime security” in the national language and how does it directly translate into English? (2) Does the national government have an official definition for maritime security? Is so, what is it?  If not, is there a consensus about the appropriate usage of the term? (3) What are the national government’s key documents for defining and understanding maritime security? (4) To the national government which of the following are elements of maritime security: environmental protection, mariner safety, fisheries management, resource management, counter-terrorism, law enforcement, naval operations, deterrence? and (5) Has this definition and usage changed or evolved over the last 20 years?  The roundtable will not be recorded, but its findings will be published after the event.

About the Speakers

Jay L Batongbacal is a lawyer with degrees in Political Science and Law from the University of the Philippines, as well as advanced degrees of Master of Marine Management and Doctor in the Science of Law, both from Dalhousie University in Canada. Since 1997, he has done diverse work and widely published on maritime affairs, including community based fisheries management, coastal resource management, marine environment protection, maritime boundaries, high seas fishing, offshore energy, seafaring, and shipping. He has carried out these research activities under the auspices of the Philippine Center for Marine Affairs between 1997-2003, as part of his own academic interests while undertaking his doctoral studies in Canada between 2003-2008, and as a member of the faculty of the UP College of Law from 2008 to the present. He has also served as legal/policy specialist on various foreign-assisted development/management projects such as the Coastal Resource Management Project, the Fisheries Resource Management Project, and the Coral Triangle Initiative Support Program.

Dr Batongbacal was legal advisor to the Philippine delegation that successfully pursued the Philippines’ claim to a continental shelf beyond 200 nautical miles in the Benham Rise Region before the Commission on the Limits of the Continental Shelf in accordance with the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS).  He recently assisted the Philippines in making an application to the International Maritime Organization for the designation of a Particularly Sensitive Sea Area in the Sulu Sea. He is also on his second term as one of the UNESCO List of Experts on Marine Scientific Research for purposes of Special Arbitration under UNCLOS Annex VIII. Presently, he is a full Professor at the University of the Philippines College of Law, and chairs the Graduate Studies Committee which oversees the College’s LLM Program. He is concurrently Director of the Institute for Maritime Affairs and Law of the Sea of the U.P. Law Center.

Dr Batongbacal has also conducted, upon request, many briefings and submitted opinions to various government offices, such as the Office of the President, the Department of Foreign Affairs, Department of National Defense, National Security Council, Cabinet Committee on Maritime and Ocean Affairs, the Committee on Foreign Affairs of the House of Representatives, the Committee on National Defense of the Philippine Senate, among others. He remains actively involved with both government and non-government organization on many different issues involving a maritime component, including the mining and petroleum industries. His commentaries and insights on Philippine maritime affairs have often appeared in traditional and online press in the Philippines and abroad.

Kentaro Furuya is working for the Japan Coast Guard for more than 30 years, both onboard and shore. He dedicated himself to maritime search and rescue, investigation of crimes at sea, and planning and execution of maritime security operations. He had been assigned as a Japanese delegation to the International Maritime Organization and other international conferences relating to maritime laws and security measures for counter-piracy and counter-terrorism operations.

He was assigned as an associate professor at the Japan Coast Guard Academy in 2012. He taught international law and law of the sea to students from ASEAN countries. In April 2015, he moved to GRIPS as a joint associate professor. As a dual-appointment faculty member, he taught Law of the Sea and coast guard policies to both overseas and domestic postgraduate students. He was assigned a professor at the JCGA and an adjunct professor at GRIPS in 2018.

Prakash Gopal is a PhD candidate at the Australian National Centre for Ocean Resources and Security (ANCORS), University of Wollongong, Australia since July 2018. He is a graduate of the Australian Command and Staff College, Canberra, and has Masters degrees in both sciences and humanities. As a former Indian naval officer, he has significant experience in maritime security operations in the Indo-Pacific, and in maritime policy/strategy formulation. He has served on a range of frontline ships as a surface warfare officer, and has commanded an anti-submarine corvette based at Mumbai. In the latter part of his naval career, Prakash was involved in policy formulation as a Joint Director at the Indian naval headquarters, and went on to serve as naval advisor to the head of the Indian Coast Guard. Prior to his transition out of the navy, he was a research fellow at the National Maritime Foundation, New Delhi from 2016-18, and visiting faculty at the Foreign Services Institute of India. His primary research interests lie in India’s maritime security imperatives, international maritime cooperation and maritime domain awareness in the Indo-Pacific.

Blake Herzinger is an Indo-Pacific policy specialist and U.S. Navy Reserve officer. He spent nearly a decade in active service with the U.S. Navy as an intelligence officer, with experience in the Middle East and across the Indo-Pacific. He is broadly interested in security assistance dynamics and seapower. He has published on naval affairs, Asian security, and U.S. foreign policy with Brookings, Foreign Policy, War on the Rocks, The Diplomat, and ASPI’s The Strategist, among others. He is a graduate of the Strategic Studies MSc program at the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies and received his BA at Brigham Young University.

Gilang Kembara is a Researcher at the Centre for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) in Jakarta, Indonesia. His research mainly focuses on the field of maritime safety and security, transboundary security issues, and maritime regional cooperation. Gilang has collaborated with a variety of think tanks both domestic and international. He worked with the National Institute of South China Sea Studies (NISCSS) in China to help establish the China Southeast Asia Research Centre on South China Sea (CSARC), where he was enrolled as a Research Associate. Together with CSARC, he helped convene a group of experts to cooperate on fisheries and environmental issues in the South China Sea. Gilang Kembara graduated from the University of Birmingham, earning a BSc. in Management. He continued his studies at the University of Birmingham, taking International Relations in Contemporary Asia-Pacific, and received his Master of Arts (MA) degree.

Somjade Kongrawd was born on April 24, 1959, in Bangkok and currently live in Bangkok.

He  works as a  Subcommittee member on Maritime Transportation and Merchant  Marine under the Communications Committee of the House of Senates, Specialist to the Communications Committee of the House of Senates, a Subcommittee  member on Natural Resources and Environment under National  Reform Steering Assembly, a member of  Security Working Group on Advisory and Knowledge Management, a member of Subcommittee under Thai Maritime Enforcement Command Centre  (TMECC) , a member of Legal Working Group on Advisory and Knowledge Management   Subcommittee, Thai Maritime Enforcement Command Centre (TMECC), a  Board Member of Diving Association of Thailand, and an Instructor for Naval War College, Royal Thai Navy (RTN).

He retired in 2019 after serving the RTN. for 32 years as a legal adviser and instructor after of working, including the Director of Office of the Judge Advocate General, the Director of Office of Investigation and Legal Affairs under TMECC, Chief of Office of Legal Affairs under Command Centre for Combating Illegal Fishing (CCCIF), a Judge in Appeal Military Court, a strategist under Center for Naval Strategic Studies, an instructor of Institute of Advanced Naval Studies.

He graduated with Bachelor of Law from Ramkamhaeng University and Master of Law (Public Law) from Thammasat University, including Master of Art (Maritime Policy) from University of Wollongong, Australia, Cert. in National Security Law, Center for National Security Law, University of Virginia, USA, -Dip. in Rhodes academy of Oceans Law and Policy, Greece, Cert. in Maritime Non-Traditional Security: MNTS at Malaysian Institute of Maritime Academy (MIMA), Malaysia, Cert. in Maritime Security, Regulation and Enforcement Workshop, at Australian National Center for Ocean Resources and Security (ANCORS), Cert. in Fisheries Management at  Australian National Center for Ocean Resources and Security (ANCORS), Australia and Cert.in Building Maritime Share Awareness in Southeast Asia (MSA V) Workshop at Daniel K. Inouye Asia-Pacific Centre for Security Studies Hawaii.

Tharishini Krishnan is a senior lecturer at the Department of Strategic Studies, Faculty of Defence Studies and Management, National Defence University Malaysia (NDUM). She did first degree in International Relations in 2005 and furthered her Masters in Strategic and Security Analyses in 2008 at the National University of Malaysia. After joining as an academic staff at NDUM, she went abroad to King’s College London in 2012 to pursue a PhD Degree on Contemporary India Research at the King’s India Institute.

In 2016- 2017, she was appointed as the fellow of Joint Chair of Derby – NDUM. She has been a member of Indian Ocean Research Group since 2017. In 2021, she became an associate member of the Corbett Centre for Maritime Policy Studies at King’s College London. She was 2019 ASEAN-India Youth Summit participant where she was awarded the ASEAN-India Youth Award for Malaysian category. Currently, she is a research fellow at the Centre of Defence and International Security Studies (CDiSS), NDUM and the head research cluster for Global Security and International Relations at her faculty. She is also the coordinator for the Master in Strategic and Defence Studies program in her department. She has been an invited speaker at Malaysian Institute of Defence and Security (MIDAS), Indonesia Defence University, Council of International Law and Diplomacy and an invited consultant with the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime.

Her teaching experiences covers International Relations, Strategic Studies, and Naval and Maritime Strategy. She also lectures at the Malaysian Armed Forces Staff College (MTAT) where she teaches International Relations. At the National Resilience College (NRC), she lectures International Organisations and Extra Regional Affairs. She supervises research in the field of maritime security and policies.

Her main research interests include maritime security and policy, Indian Ocean and Indo- Pacific strategy.

Lee YingHui is an independent researcher on maritime security issues in the Indo-Pacific. She was previously Associate Reserach Fellow with the Maritime Security Programme at RSIS. Her recent publications include Lee YingHui and Li Mingjiang, “ASEAN’s involvement in the South China Sea Disputes: The Economics-Security Conundrum” in Gordon Houlden, Scott Romaniuk and Nong Hong (eds.) Security, Strategy, and Military Dynamics in the South China Sea, 2021, Bristol University Press and Lee YingHui, “Strengthening ASEAN-ROK Maritime Connectivity: Gaps and Way Forward”, in Hoo Chiew Ping (ed.) The New Southern Policy: Catalyst for Deepening ASEAN-ROK Cooperation, 2020, Institute of Strategic and International Studies Malaysia.

David Letts holds academic appointments at the Australian National University, Canberra and the Australian National Centre for Ocean Resources and Security, University of Wollongong. Prior to pursuing his academic career, David enjoyed more than thirty years of full-time service in the Royal Australian Navy. He regularly teaches and writes on the law of the sea and maritime security topics, as well as assisting a number of United Nations and non-governmental agencies with law of the sea dissemination activities.

Dita Liliansa is currently a Research Associate at the Centre for International Law (CIL), National University of Singapore. She obtained her law degrees from the University of Indonesia and the University of Washington as a Fulbright scholar. She previously worked as an academic in Indonesia, and has provided expertise to government agencies, international organizations, and private entities. In 2018, she was awarded special recognition as the Best Oralist of IFLOS Moot Court Competition at the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea (ITLOS). Most recently, her article on “The Necessity of Indonesia’s Measures to Sink Vessels for IUU Fishing in the Exclusive Economic Zone” won the Second Prize of the 2021 Asian Society of International Law (AsianSIL) Junior Scholar Award. Her current research focuses on the protection of marine environment in Southeast Asia, in which she investigates the extent to which ASEAN promotes the implementation of international laws related to the protection of marine environment. In addition to research, she is involved in teaching university students and training government officials as well as participates in international and regional intergovernmental meetings as an observer.

Nguyen Nam Duong is Associate Professor of Political Science at the Diplomatic Academy of Vietnam (DAV) and also Deputy Director General of the DAV East Sea (South China Sea) Institute. Nam Duong holds a PhD in Politics from the University of New South Wales in Canberra in 2010 and has completed his diplomatic posting as Counselor at the Permanent Mission of Vietnam to the United Nations (New York) from 2016 to 2019. His research interests include international relations in the Indo-Pacific, security and maritime issues in Southeast Asia, and foreign policy of Vietnam.

Asyura Salleh is the Co-Founder of the Global Awareness & Impact Alliance (GAIA). She is also a non-Resident Vasey Research Fellow for the Pacific Forum, and the Special Advisor on Maritime Security for the Yokosuka Council on Asia Pacific Affairs (YCAPS). Her policy experience lies in her work for the UNODC Global Maritime Crime Programme, Stable Seas, and Brunei Prime Minister’s Officer. Dr Asyura’s research interest lies in maritime security in the Asia Pacific, with a focus on transnational maritime crime and maritime governance. Dr Asyura gained a Masters in War Studies from King’s College London and earned a doctorate in International Relations from the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies Singapore.