Norway, Russia reach deal to turn down heat on Arctic claims

RANDY BOSWELL
POSTMEDIA NEWS

Recent efforts by Canada and other polar nations to avoid Arctic territorial conflicts got a major boost on Wednesday with the signing of a “historic” agreement between Norway and Russia establishing a new offshore boundary in the long-contested waters of the Barents Sea.

The completion of the border treaty – tentatively announced in April but finalized Wednesday after months of negotiations – is the latest sign of how Canada and the four other countries with Arctic Ocean coastlines are striving to turn down the heat on territorial disputes that, just a few years ago, had raised concerns about possible military confrontations over oil and other polar resources.

“This is a historic milestone,” Norwegian Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg said in a statement after a signing ceremony held in Murmansk with Russian President Dmitry Medvedev and the two countries’ foreign ministers.

The final agreement, subject to approval by the countries’ legislatures, ends a dispute over a 175,000-sq.-km section of the Arctic Ocean that has been a source of friction between Norway and Russia for 40 years. The solution divides the area roughly in half.

“The treaty resolves what for several decades remained the most important outstanding issue between Norway and Russia,” Stoltenberg stated. “It sends an important signal to the rest of the world – the Arctic is a peaceful region where any issues that arise are resolved in accordance with international law.”

Confrontational episodes over Arctic issues – such as the recent exchange of fiery words between Canada and Russia over Arctic test flights by Russian military jets – are becoming exceptions in an era of distinctly reduced polar tensions.

The ongoing thaw in relations among the Arctic’s five coastal states – Canada, Russia, Norway, the U.S. and Denmark – was also in evidence in recent weeks when Canadian and American officials met in Ottawa for talks aimed at resolving a 40-year-old dispute over the maritime boundary in the Beaufort Sea north of Alaska and the Yukon.

Foreign Minister Lawrence Cannon has repeated several times this year that the Canadian government is determined to negotiate solutions to the Beaufort Sea dispute and another maritime boundary conflict with Denmark in the Lincoln Sea north of Ellesmere Island and Danish-controlled Greenland.

Disputes over offshore boundaries in the Arctic had become more pronounced earlier in the decade as melting polar ice began fuelling visions of increased northern shipping and potentially lucrative oil and gas development.

Competing bids by the Arctic Ocean Five to secure extended seabed territory under a UN treaty had only reinforced the impression that a new “Cold War” was emerging in the Arctic.

But after a Russian scientific team planted a flag on the North Pole sea floor in 2007 – a purely symbolic act that nevertheless ignited outrage in Canada and elsewhere -governments began moving to tone down the belligerent rhetoric and seek to reassure international bodies such as the UN and European Union that Arctic territorial issues could be worked out peacefully and without intervention by outside organizations.

The Barents Sea dispute was a particularly significant one because both Russia and Norway had been coveting possible petroleum deposits in the area of overlapping claims.

“The fact that Moscow has surrendered its claim to half the area is hugely significant,” University of British Columbia polar expert Michael Byers told Postmedia News after the initial deal was announced in April.

“It provides concrete evidence of Russia’s willingness to co-operate in the Arctic – even with much weaker states.”

Norway and Russia have established a new offshore boundary in the long-contested waters of the Barents Sea, shown here from the border town of Kirkenes, Norway. (PHOTO BY JANE GEORGE)