CONCLUSION En conclusion et en l’état actuel des événements, tant que la Cour permanente d’arbitrage de La Haye n’a pas rendu son verdict quant à la légitimité ou non du tracé en neuf/dix traits, les pays d’Asie du Sud-est, en insistant pour négocier un code de conduite contraignant, sont en train de tresser la corde avec laquelle la Chine les pendra en termes d’usage de la mer de Chine méridionale.
But today, as long as the Permanent Court of Arbitration, in The Hague, has not yet pronounced its verdict in the case introduced by the Philippines against China, at the moment when the fateful deadline of the general elections in the Philippines appears on the horizon, and because all those events are intertwined, the crucial question that is raising from all that, is if ever one day the negotiations succeed in reaching a COC, whether the result will not finally turn against the coastal South East Asian nations of the South China Sea.