A long wait for Arctic claims resolution could be positive

The Ukraine Crisis has complicated the otherwise stable state of affairs in the Arctic between Russia and the West. That could make it more difficult to get them to agree on a territorial settlement concerning the continental shelves in the Arctic Ocean.

As it stands, however, the Arctic Coastal States are in for a long wait, perhaps of more than a decade, as the claims of each has to be treated by the UN Commission on the Limits of the Continental Shelf (CLCS), Mikkel Runge writes in the report 'Arctic Security Matters' published by the European Union Institute for Security Studies (EUISS).

Since the CLCS can very well end up validating overlapping claims, it may not end up doing much else except postponing the eventual negotiations between the states. Considering the present conflict over Ukraine, however, this may be fortunate, but it also means that the littoral Arctic governments would do well to use that time to prepare a strategy for resolving their territorial disagreements.