ABSTRACT
The right of innocent passage is well-rooted in state practice. The maritime user states wanted a more liberal regime than innocent passage through archipelagic waters and straits used for international navigation. Major maritime powers have typically sought maximum freedoms of navigation with greater advantages to be obtained from not giving prior notification of transits by their warships through the territorial sea of another state while allowing foreign warships to transit in their own territorial sea without notification. The regime of transit passage gives all ships and aircraft the right to travel through straits used for international navigation in their normal operational mode on, under or over the sea. The mode of transit adopted by ships and aircraft exercising transit and archipelagic sea lanes passage is another difficult issue with implementing the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea navigational regimes in the region.
