By Fel V. Maragay

The long-overdue bill delineating the country?s archipelagic baselines was approved by the bicameral conference committee, with the panel from the House of Representatives accepting the Senate?s version to treat the Kalayaan Islands and Scarborough Shoal as a ?regime of islands? instead of being enclosed within the baselines.

Senate President Juan Ponce Enrile, who chaired the Senate panel in the joint committee, said that the baselines bill was approved after they exchanged arguments the whole morning.

He said they would meet again to go over the final version and sign the bicameral conference committee report after its text is refined by a technical working group.

Under the House version of the bill, the Kalayaan Islands and Scarborough fall within the baselines. But this was not acceptable to Malaca?ang because this will be tantamount to an explicit declaration that these are part of Philippine territory which will provoke hostility from other claimant-countries that include China, Vietnam and Taiwan.

Beijing has warned the Philippines against explicitly declaring ownership of the Kalayaan Islands?part of the Spratly islands ?which will constitute a breach of the declaration of conduct in the South China Sea signed by the claimant-countries.

Asked how the House panel was persuaded to adopt the Senate version, Enrile said ?we showed them the nomenclature or the mechanics that is authorized by the United Nations convention on the law of the sea.?

While the Senate version has prevailed, there are provisions in the House bill that the two panels would include in the final version of the proposed law.

The treatment of the Kalayaan Islands and Scarborough Shoal as mere regime of islands was originally rejected by opposition senators led by Minority Leader Aquilino Pimentel Jr.

But they withdrew their objection after the Senate adopted their suggestion to note that these disputed territories should be subject to the sovereignty and jurisdiction of the Philippine republic.

Pimentel said Cebu Rep. Antonio Cuenco, chairman of the House committee on foreign affairs, had agreed to this compromise.

Enrile laughed off the criticism that it would be unconstitutional to place the Kalayaan Islands and Scarborough Shoal outside the baselines.