Denmark on Monday joined the rush to assert a claim to the mineral riches of the Arctic, sending an expedition to map the seabed north of Greenland following moves in the region by Russia and Canada.
The results of the expedition may enable Denmark to prove that the Lomonosov Ridge, an underwater mountain chain that extends from Greenland to Siberia, is an extension of Greenland and lay claim to its rights in a region believed to contain important oil and gas deposits.
Embarking on the Swedish ice-breaker Oden, 45 researchers sailed from northern Norway on Sunday towards their goal. The researchers will spend close to five weeks combing the area between latitudes 83 and 87 north, to the north of Greenland, an autonomous Danish territory.
"Five potential claim areas have been identified off the Faroe Islands and Greenland, potentially including the North Pole," Danish Minister of Science, Technology and Development Helge Sander wrote on the government's website. Russia has already claimed a large part of this region, asserting that the Lomonosov Ridge is an extension of Siberia.
On August 2, the Russian expedition planted a Russian flag in titanium more than 4,000 metres (13,123 feet) under the North Pole at the end of an expedition that relaunched the quest for the Arctic. The Danish expedition, called Lomrog 2007, will receive assistance from a Russian ice-breaking nuclear submarine, Sander said.
Canada, Denmark, Norway, Russia and the United States are at odds over 1.2 million square kilometers (460,000 square miles) of Arctic seabed, thought to hold 25 percent of the world's undiscovered oil and gas according to the US Geological Survey.
The rivalry has heated up as melting polar ice makes the region more accessible, and could open the Northwest Passage to year-round shipping by 2050. Canada also asserts that the Lomonosov Ridge is an extension of its continental shelf.
The UN convention on the Law of the Sea gives countries that are signatories to the treaty the possibility to challenge claims of seabed sovereignty if they want to assert their claims beyond the 200-mile (320-kilometre) zone. They have 10 years to do so after ratifying the convention.
Of the five Arctic countries only Russia and Norway - who have laid claims to the seabed around the Svalbard archipelago and part of the Norwegian Sea - have so far presented such claims.
Russia, which ratified the convention in 1997, presented its claim in 2001. Denmark, which ratified it in 2004, has until 2014 to do so. Canada has not officially made any claims, though Canadian Foreign Minister Peter MacKay dismissed Russia's flag-planting at the North Pole as a "15th century" stunt that does not bolster its claim to the Arctic.
Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper just wrapped up a three-day trek across the North and attended a massive Canadian military exercise in the Arctic. Meanwhile, Denmark has been sending somewhat contradictory signals about its intentions in the Arctic.
Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen has, according to Danish media, said that the North Pole is a "joint possession" while his science minister, Helge Sander, appeared to take a more forceful stance.
While the North Pole may be in international waters, "some countries including Denmark are trying to figure out if they have claims to the exploration of resources located under the North Pole seabed," Danish news agency Ritzau quoted Sander as saying.
Comments
Comments are closed.