Illegal, unreported and unregulated fishing has been described as the leading maritime security threat and the Chinese distant water fishing fleet is likely to be the world’s leading perpetrator. While Beijing has taken steps to address wrongdoing in the Chinese fishing industry, it might continue...

At a time of geopolitical uncertainty and with multilateralism under pressure, this conference brought together diverse actors to explore the evolving role of international law on critical security and economic issues in the Asia-Pacific.

As well as defining the maritime boundaries between Papua New Guinea and Australia, the Treaty protects the ways of life of traditional inhabitants in the Torres Strait Protected Zone (TSPZ). Subsidiary management arrangements for commercial fisheries in the Zone have also been put in place...

This narrative focuses on the Timor Sea and the sovereignty issue over the part of the continental shelf that is adjacent to Australia’s northern coast and which has been coveted by both Indonesia and Timor-Leste.

After a decade of dedicated attention to Somali piracy in the Horn of Africa, the international community is focussing increasingly on the rising challenges of maritime security in the Gulf of Guinea. This includes Denmark. Recent Danish engagement in maritime security in the Global south...

The management, governance and control of the world’s oceans have become major policy and research agendas. Nowhere is this more the case than in the Pacific Ocean, the world’s largest ocean.

This paper discusses Australia’s position on the 2016 arbitral ruling in the South China Sea Arbitration (The Republic of the Philippines v The People’s Republic of China). Australia’s Foreign Minister has stated that this was an important test-case for how the East Asian region can...

In this Centre of Gravity paper, Christopher B. Roberts, Director of the National Asian Studies Centre at the University of Canberra and a Visiting Fellow at the Strategic & Defence Studies Centre, argues that Francis Fukuyama’s famous ‘end of history’ thesis is being challenged by...

The ‘grey zone’ has received much publicity in recent years as certain nation-states have employed indirect methods to achieve advantage over their opponents without recourse to open kinetic warfare.

This report argues that over the past five years, there’s been an increase in coastguard and maritime border response capabilities across much of ASEAN. The report highlights an opportunity for Australia to cooperate and collaborate with partners across the region on surveillance, maritime domain awareness...