• Summary

This legal document contains Solomon Islands’ Delimitation of Marine Waters Act, 1978 (Act No. 32 of 21 December 1978) promulgated in 1978. This Act includes, inter alia, the definition of, the demarcation of, the legal characteristics of, and regulations regarding the internal water, archipelagic water, territorial sea, exclusive economic zone, and continental shelf of Solomon Islands and the rights and responsibility of Solomon Islands as well as other states in the mentioned maritime zones of Solomon Islands.

Notably, regarding the delimitation of the territorial sea, this Act specifies that as the median line between Solomon Islands and Papua New Guinea is less than 12 nm from each state’s territorial sea baseline, the territorial sea of Solomon Islands in the said area “shall be those declared by the Minister by order published in the Gazette.” Moreover, this Act also clarifies that Solomon Islands opts for the use of median line for the delimitation of EEZ with adjacent/opposite states.

Specific coordinates constituting the straight baselines that determine the outermost limit of Solomon Islands’ archipelagic water and the innermost limits of Solomon Islands’ territorial sea of the archipelagos of Solomon Islands are provided in Solomon Islands’ Legal Notice No.41 of 1979. 

• Document: Solomon Islands Delimitation of Marine Waters Act, 1978 (Act No. 32 of 21 December 1978)
• Related Document: Solomon Islands Legal Notice No. 41 of 1979: Declaration of Archipelagic Baselines