Moscow, December 25 – The United States’ claims of expanding the continental shelf in the Arctic are devoid of international legal basis, according to Vice-Speaker of the Federation Council, Konstantin Kosachev, as reported in a Telegram channel. Kosachev was commenting on Washington’s publication of new official maps, which indicate that the continental shelf now extends beyond 200 nautical miles from the coast in the Arctic, Atlantic, Bering Sea, Pacific Ocean, two sections of the Gulf of Mexico, and near the Mariana Islands. The US State Department clarified that this does not create territorial disputes with Russia, but will require resolution with Canada and Japan. Kosachev explained that the United States has not ratified the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, making them an outlier among all maritime states. Claims to the continental shelf should be considered by the UN Commission. “As a result, today Americans are acting without any international legal basis, meaning the international community has every right not to recognize the new boundaries,” the senator wrote. He added that the mandate of the commission is based on Article 76, paragraph 8 of the 1982 United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea. Russia fully complies with the provisions of the convention, which require submitting applications for shelf extension to the commission. “By the way, the last time Russia received positive recommendations from the Commission for the expansion of its shelf in the Arctic was in February 2023. This work continues now,” Kosachev noted. According to him, this time “the Americans have outdone themselves,” ignoring the territorial interests of their own allies – Canada and Japan. “I would like to remind you that the Obama administration made futile attempts to ratify the 1982 Convention back in 2012. Republicans in the US Senate buried this idea, claiming that the convention undermines US national sovereignty (after this incident, the Senate became known as the ‘graveyard of international agreements’),” the senator concluded. According to Bloomberg, the expanded continental shelf primarily covers areas in the Arctic and Bering Sea. The US aims to gain access to minerals for electric vehicle battery production. Additionally, there are oil and gas deposits on the shelf.
