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Russia Lambasts 'Unacceptable' US Claims to Arctic Shelf

Sputnik News

20231224

MOSCOW (Sputnik) - Russia is taking all necessary measures to secure its national interests in the Arctic amid the Washington's "unacceptable" attempts to unilaterally extend its continental shelf claims, Grigory Karasin, head of the foreign affairs committee of Russia's upper house of parliament, told Sputnik on Sunday.

"We have taken and will continue to take all measures that are necessary for our national interests in this geographical area," Karasin said, answering a question about whether the Washington's recently announced claims to the continental shelf pose any sort of threat to Russia.

On Tuesday, US authorities released updated coordinates of the nation's extended continental shelf (ECS) claims beyond 200 nautical miles from coasts in the Arctic, the Atlantic, the Bering Sea, the Pacific, the Mariana Islands, and two areas in the Gulf of Mexico. The ECS is not expected to create any territorial disputes with Russia, but will overlap with Canada, The Bahamas, and Japan, according to the US State Department.

Karasin stressed that the unilateral attempt to expand US maritime borders in the Arctic region is unacceptable.

"Unilateral expansion of borders in the Arctic is unacceptable and can only lead to increased tension. It is necessary, first of all, to prove the geological affiliation of these territories, just as Russia did," Karasin said, pointing out that Moscow's Arctic claims were considered by a United Nations subcommittee based on a trove of collected evidence, while the US has not even ratified and is not a party to the Convention on the Law of the Sea - the fundamental 1982 UN treaty laying down rules governing the use of the world's oceans and their resources.

The US move to extend its claims to the continental shelf by about a million square kilometers, an area about twice the size of California, comes amid the growing realization by world powers that the far north will play a fundamental role in the economic and geostrategic future of the northern hemisphere.

The Arctic is believed to be home to trillions of dollars' worth of virtually untapped natural resources, including hydrocarbons, and is a major alternative to traditional trade routes between Europe and Asia. Russia, for example, is betting big on its Northern Sea Route becoming a major maritime trade route in the years and decades to come, and has invested billions in Arctic civilian and military infrastructure and icebreaker technology amid the ever-present threat of NATO encroachment.

© Sputnik