Australia, the US, and Japan are stepping up after the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) failed to take a stand against China for its base-building campaign in the South China Sea, despite their competing territorial claims in the resource-rich waters.

Foreign Minister Julie Bishop and her US and Japanese counterparts met on the sidelines of an ASEAN meeting in Vientiane, during which the Southeast Asian ministers couldn't muster a consensus.  The three are backed by the recent decision by a permanent arbitration panel in The Hague, which ruled that China's claim to practically all of the South China Sea - which is hundreds of kilometers beyond its internationally-recognized maritime borders - is illegal.  The three allies are urging Beijing not to construct any more military outposts and reclaim land in the disputed South China Sea, through which US$5 Trillion of shipping traffic passes every year. 

"The ministers expressed their serious concerns over maritime disputes in the South China Sea.  The ministers voiced their strong opposition to any coercive unilateral actions that could alter the status quo and increase tensions," said the statement issued by Secretary of State John Kerry, Japan's Foreign Ministers Fumio Kishida, plus Ms. Bishop.  It went on to urge all parties against "unilateral actions that cause permanent physical change to the marine environment", and from "such actions as large-scale land reclamation, and the construction of outposts as well as the use of those outposts for military purposes". 

This came in a case brought by the Philippines, but the ruling implicitly says that China has no standing in similar disputes with Malaysia, Brunei, and Vietnam, which also are ASEAN members.  China has the support of Cambodia and Laos which blocked ASEAN from issuing a joint communique.