Russia’s Arctic claim to North Pole to put political heat on Canada, expert

OTTAWA – A defence expert says Russia’s new bid for a vast swath of Arctic territory, including the North Pole, backs Canada into an uncomfortable corner in future negotiations over the frozen region.

Moscow’s revised international submission was revealed today in a statement by the country’s foreign ministry and claims 1.2 million square kilometres of the Arctic shelf.

Russia, the U.S., Canada, Denmark and Norway are working with the UN to define jurisdictional boundaries in the Arctic, which is thought to hold as much as a quarter of the planet’s undiscovered oil and gas.

In late 2013, the Harper government ordered officials to rewrite Canada’s Arctic claim to include the North Pole and more survey work is taking place this summer before Ottawa submits the document.

Rob Huebert of the University of Calgary says Prime Minister Stephen Harper should make clear whether Canada is eventually willing to negotiate with Russia where claims intersect.

He says the government has taken a tough line on Russia’s annexation of Crimea and the questions that need to be asked are when does Canada re-engage diplomatically and whether that would signal de facto acceptance of the situation in Ukraine.