Canada’s Arctic claim

The Canadian government is going to try and extend our country’s territorial claims in the Arctic all the way to the North Pole.

The plan is in motion even though the area hasn’t been fully mapped and there’s no scientific evidence to back the claim. A formal scientific submission was made to the United Nations last week covering territorial claims. John Baird, Minister of Foreign Affairs: “Obtaining international recognition for the outer limits of our continental shelf, and the legal certainty it brings, will be vital to the future development of our off-shore resources.”

The government says the material submitted for the Arctic Ocean is only preliminary. The U.N. submissions do not lead to a binding decision but lay the groundwork for future country-to-country negotiations over competing territorial claims. In all, Canada claims cover 1.2 million square kilometres of ocean; that’s an area the size of Alberta and Saskatchewan combined. Baird says scientists have been asked to do additional work following a 10-year exercise in mapping Canada’s continental shelf.