David Wright: Canada Must Stand Up to China's Claim to the Arctic
[David Wright is a research fellow of the Canadian Defence & Foreign Affairs Institute and associate professor of history with the University of Calgary.]
Acute observers in China know the resources of the Canadian Arctic and its Northwest Passage will continue to guarantee Canada's status as a wealthy and developed country well into the 21st century. Not all of them are happy about this, given Canada's tiny population and the burgeoning and resource-hungry populations of the world's non-Arctic countries (of which China sees itself as chief). China feels entitled to a share of the Arctic's natural resource wealth and wants to see as much of the Arctic as possible remain international territory....
Some Chinese analysts want to see Canada's sovereignty over the Northwest Passage watered down or defined into meaninglessness, largely on the Svalbard Islands model. China and several other major countries that have no Arctic coastline of their own have set up Arctic research stations in the Svalbard Islands, an Arctic archipelago which, supposedly and technically, is controlled by Norway.
But not really. In 1920 Norway signed an international agreement giving Norway "full and absolute sovereignty" over the Svalbards, but granting the citizens of each signatory state "equal liberty of access and entry for any reason or object whatever." Hence today, the Chinese and anybody else whose country signed the agreement can pretty much come and go as they like in the Svalbards.
Could, or should, Canadian "sovereignty" over the Northwest Passage suffer a similar fate? Some Chinese academics seem to think so. If they had their way, Canada would have token "full and absolute sovereignty" over the Northwest Passage, but would be able to do the square root of squat about anything happening there....
Read entire article at Calgary Herald
Acute observers in China know the resources of the Canadian Arctic and its Northwest Passage will continue to guarantee Canada's status as a wealthy and developed country well into the 21st century. Not all of them are happy about this, given Canada's tiny population and the burgeoning and resource-hungry populations of the world's non-Arctic countries (of which China sees itself as chief). China feels entitled to a share of the Arctic's natural resource wealth and wants to see as much of the Arctic as possible remain international territory....
Some Chinese analysts want to see Canada's sovereignty over the Northwest Passage watered down or defined into meaninglessness, largely on the Svalbard Islands model. China and several other major countries that have no Arctic coastline of their own have set up Arctic research stations in the Svalbard Islands, an Arctic archipelago which, supposedly and technically, is controlled by Norway.
But not really. In 1920 Norway signed an international agreement giving Norway "full and absolute sovereignty" over the Svalbards, but granting the citizens of each signatory state "equal liberty of access and entry for any reason or object whatever." Hence today, the Chinese and anybody else whose country signed the agreement can pretty much come and go as they like in the Svalbards.
Could, or should, Canadian "sovereignty" over the Northwest Passage suffer a similar fate? Some Chinese academics seem to think so. If they had their way, Canada would have token "full and absolute sovereignty" over the Northwest Passage, but would be able to do the square root of squat about anything happening there....