The Antarctic Continental Shelf Beyond 200 Miles: A Juridical Rubik’s Cube

Abstract

The difficulties that arise when the global law of the sea solutions are applied in the specific legal and political, and indeed natural, context of the Antarctic region have so far been the subject of several analyses.¹ However, there is one emerging and particularly intricate law of the sea issue for states cooperating in management of the Antarctic region that has seldom been explored, that of what is to be done with the requirement contained in the LOS Convention that relates to the submission of information on the outer limit of the continental shelf beyond 200 miles² to the Commission on the Limits of the Continental Shelf. This issue can be compared to the Rubik’s cube in its juridical form, but which also has the intrinsic nature of a ‘time-bomb’ because, according to the letter of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (LOS Convention),³ the issue awaits the countries claiming sovereignty over portions of territory in the Antarctic 10 years after the entry into force of the Convention for each.

Article FootNote

This chapter is an updated and revised version of a part of material published by the author in Ocean Development and International Law, Vol. 31, 2000. Important developments which occurred soon after the submission of that article for publication in October 1999 have prompted the publication of a part of the material here, in an abridged and updated version.

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¹ For an overall study of the law of the sea issues and the Antarctic, see C.C. Joyner, Antarctica and the Law of the Sea (Dordrecht: Martinus Nijhoff, 1992), which remains the only available monograph on the subject. Among several shorter studies see especially: F. Orrego Vicuña, ‘The Law of the Sea and the Antarctic Treaty System: New Approaches to Offshore Jurisdiction’, in C.C. Joyner and S.K. Chopra (eds.), The Antarctic Legal Regime (Dordrecht: Martinus Nijhoff, 1988), pp. 97-127; C.C. Joyner, ‘The Antarctic Treaty System and the Law of the Sea - Competing Regimes in the Southern Ocean?’, The International Journal of Marine and Coastal Law, Vol. 10, 1995, pp. 301-331; D. Vidas, ‘The Antarctic Treaty System and the Law of the Sea: A New Dimension Introduced by the Protocol’, in O.S. Stokke and D. Vidas (eds.), Governing the Antarctic: The Effectiveness and Legitimacy of the Antarctic Treaty System (Cambridge University Press, 1996), pp. 61-90; T. Scovazzi, ‘The Antarctic Treaty System and the New Law of the Sea: Selected Questions’, in F. Francioni and T. Scovazzi (eds.), International Law for Antarctica, 2nd edition (The Hague: Kluwer Law International, 1996), pp. 377-394; and P. Gautier, ‘The Maritime Area of the Antarctic and the New Law of the Sea’, in J. Verhoeven, P. Sands and M. Bruce (eds.), The Antarctic Environment and International Law (London: Graham & Trotman, 1992).

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² All references to miles herein indicate nautical miles.

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³ UN doc. A/CONF.62/122, 10 December 1982; text reprinted in ILM, Vol. 21, 1982, pp. 1,261ff. The LOS Convention entered in force on 16 November 1994.