This study's purpose is to analyze the decisions delivered by the inter- national courts and tribunals including the International Court of Justice(ICJ) and International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea(ITLOS) and to apply the implications to the Dokto issue. This study carried out analysis on various international decisions to figure out the international judicial organs' position about the historic evidences, effective control, and critical date related to sovereignty over islands. This study also conducted a research into the decisions of the courts to know the judicial organs' stance on the island's title to maritime zones, principles and methods of maritime delimitation, and the effect to be given to islands on maritime delimitation lines.
Historic evidences produced by states parties to sovereignty disputes are not readily recognized by the international courts and tribunals. However, the korean historic documents and orders delivered by the japanese cabinet in 1877 will be deemed to be accepted as favorable evidences to Korea by international judicial organs. Given that the Permanent Court of International Justice(PCIJ) considered the more effective control important in the Eastern Greenland case, Korean position is expected to be favored by the international courts from the perspectives of effective occupation.
Article 121 of the Law of the Sea Convention provides that islands are eligible to territorial sea, EEZ, and continental shelf around themselves. However, rocks which cannot sustain human habitation and economic life of its own can not generate EEZ and continental shelf. Anyway Dokto is considered to be an island which is fully eligible to various maritime zones. Nowadays maritime delimitation methods have been treated more important than maritime delimitation principles in international legal forums. The 3 steps method including provisional equidistance or median delimitation line setting, adjustment of the lines considering relevant circumstances, and confirmation of equitableness of the delimitation lines is more and more organized and gradually widely accepted. Dokto is not a big island eligible to full effect on the delimitation lines, but it is to be kept in mind that island are evaluated not only by its current value but also by its future value.