Expert considers adventurous US’ unreasonable expanding of Arctic shelf

MURMANSK, August 26. /TASS/. The United States by expanding its continental shelf in the Arctic without formal evidences and geological surveys, is acting adventurously. Actions in the Arctic latitudes require uniform rules, Director General of VNIIOkeangeologiya, a marine geology institute, Boris Shumsky told TASS.
In December, 2023, the United States announced, without geological justifications, the expansion of part of its continental shelf, which Russia and Canada may also claim. The extended shelf covers an area of about 1 million square kilometers, mainly in the Arctic and the Bering Sea.
“As for the US position, it does not rely on any international documents, and this, probably, is adventurism from the state’s point of view. I hope that relevant authorities and the Russian Foreign Ministry will continue to follow a purposeful and clear position that all global players should become parties to an agreement on the continental shelf’s outer limits and should act in compliance with it,” the expert said.
He noted that the United States had not ratified the 1982 United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS), according to which states may claim any resources of the sea and seabed, including hydrocarbons and solid minerals, within up to 200 nautical miles (370 km) from the coastline.
“The United States, unlike Russia, operates without approved and signed rules,” he continued. “The Bavenit scientific research vessel has departed from Murmansk into the Laptev Sea to update the Russian Federation’s application to the UN Commission on the Limits of the Continental Shelf with new geological data. Two years ago, the first well was drilled in the East Siberian Sea, and the results, included into this application, have been interpreted. During the current expedition, the Bavenit will drill and select geological materials in the Laptev Sea near the Taymyr Peninsula.”
The expeditions will strengthen the geological justification of the Russian application for the position of the Russian Federation’s continental shelf’s outer boundary in the Eurasian basin of the Arctic Ocean in the area of the Gakkel Ridge, he explained. “We need to prove that it has a continental extension, and our external border, in compliance with international law, may be moved much further than the 200-mile zone that we may claim.”
Before the end of 2024, VNIIOceanologiya will submit to the Russian Federation’s Ministry of Natural Resources a report on possible hydrocarbon resources, solid minerals and fishing assets in that Arctic zone. “This will be a preliminary assessment, and further on we need to develop technologies, conduct research, noteworthy – in ice conditions, the work will be difficult, but very interesting. In the next 10 years, there will be certain development of new technological solutions for exploring the Arctic,” he said in conclusion.
For many years, Russian geologists have been working to study the outer underwater margin of the continent in the Arctic Ocean by using both remote methods and direct sampling of rocks. All obtained materials have been used to assert Russia’s right in expanding the continental shelf, for which the Russian Federation received partial approval from the UN Commission in 2023.
Since 2020, the Bavenit vessel has drilled 38 shallow stratigraphic wells of more than 4,800 meters long in all seas of the Arctic Ocean’s Russian sector. The expedition’s another stage has started from Murmansk. The works have been ordered by the marine geology institute, VNIIOkeangeologiya, under the Geology: the Revival of a Legend federal project in partnership with Rosneft. Russia’s geological prospecting and exploration holding company, Rosgeo, plans the works will continue to mid-September, 2024, to be completed at the port of Pevek.