... a vacuum”, as the saying goes. Many countries are known to aspire to join the Arctic Council or cooperate with this organization as observers.
The mistake committed by the Canadian ministers should not be exploited by finding a replacement for Canada on the Arctic Council in its absence or by making its positions worse at the Council’s future events. As legal experts are well aware, Canada’s absence from the Arctic Council creates a lot of procedural opportunities for reducing its role there....
... China Sea, the Senkaku and Diaoyu Islands and even the island state of Taiwan.[15]
Chinese are well aware that their territorial claims of any nature to the Arctic will not have legal grounds, so they are interested instead in seeing control over the Arctic denied to Canada, Russia and other Arctic littoral states and turning over to some sort of international mechanism.
Li Zhenfu of Dalian Maritime University in China says however that China stands a chance to make its own claims in the Arctic. According to him,...
... January 2011, attended by representatives of Britain, Iceland, Sweden, Denmark, Finland, Norway, Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. Experts identify the strategic objective of the new regional organization as curbing Russia’s military influence in the Arctic
[9]
.
Canada's position concerning NATO's role in the Arctic is opposed to that of Norway. Canada is wary of possible expansion of influence in the Arctic region of those NATO members that as in the case of Britain are not Arctic states. Experts of the Heritage ...
... so-called “official” Arctic states (which, apart from Canada, include the U.S., Russia, Denmark and Norway). Under contemporary international law, these countries have pre-emptive legal basis for the economic development of the adjacent Arctic shelf.
Canada’s main interest
is on the prospects of oil and gas development. Along with the conventional oil and gas deposits, the coastal area of Canadian Arctic has huge reserves of methane hydrate. If its commercial production is launched, these reserves ...
