deicing and conflict management

The first of these requires the existence of a real defense capacity that acts as a deterrent to all those who may be tempted by a warlike adventure. Since February 24, 2022, Europe has been discovering, on a daily basis, the need to devote financial, technological and human resources to defense as a matter of urgency. Other tools are less expensive and require less time to become operational. I think about building the operation of legal regimes that allow the various conflicts to be managed at a low level of intensity.

Before the escalation of the conflict in Ukraine, there was widespread speculation regarding the possibility of a race to the Arctic, leading to conflicts between different states. This analysis started from the counterpoint between the two polar oceans. While in Antarctica there has been, since 1959, a conventional multilateral regime that prevents conflicts, with demilitarization obligations and a moratorium on the exploration of mineral resources, in the Arctic there is no specific conventional legal regime that allows the management of conflicts between States and that guarantees the protection of natural resources.

This counterpoint applies above all to geopolitical differences. In Antarctica there are no coastal states, there is no population, there are no military objectives, there are no economic resources to be explored (with the exception of fishing) and there is no commercial movement of ships or planes. On the contrary, in the Arctic there are coastal states (Russian Federation, USA, Canada, Denmark, via Greenland, and Norway), there are several hundred thousand inhabitants, there is significant exploitation of fishing resources, oil, natural gas and minerals (with emphasis on rare earths), there is intense circulation of civil aircraft and merchant ships (with the possibility of, due to climate change, becoming more intense and permanent throughout the year using the Northern route and the Northwest passage), there is a vast network of sensors and equipment for monitoring military activities (the shortest route for inter-continental ballistic missiles passes through the Arctic).

The presence of coastal states in the Arctic requires the delimitation of maritime borders, a subject always conducive to the use of legal arguments (sector theory, equidistant borders, equitable solutions as prescribed by the Montego Bay Convention, CMB) that can easily fuel armed conflicts. After the Second World War, there were many conflicts over border delimitation in the Arctic, but coastal states were able to find solutions based on bilateral conventions. Today there remain two minor issues (one between Canada and the US in the Beaufort Sea) and two of medium caliber but not urgent: the nature of the Northwest Passage, which the US and others tend to see as a strait open to navigation international and Canada prefers to qualify as integrating its coastal waters and the extension of the continental shelf beyond 200 nautical miles (which all 5 coastal States are promoting under the CMB, despite the USA not being a party to this Convention).

The protection of the environment and natural resources has been promoted unilaterally by each of the States, using national legislation even while invoking qualifications resulting from multilateral conventional regimes (CMB, UNFCCC, Stockholm convention on POPs,…).

In the Arctic, the balance of conflict management is frankly positive and should serve as inspiration for finding negotiated solutions to conflicts raging in other parts of the world.