(MENAFN) The United States has enlarged its continental shelf to an area twice the size of California in a bid to assert control over valuable seabed resources through advanced technologies.
The State Department announced this expansion last week, establishing new geographic coordinates to delineate the extended continental shelf boundaries, covering around one million square kilometers (10.8 million square feet) across seven regions.
Under international law, the U.S. asserts its right to safeguard and manage resources and crucial habitats above and below its extended continental shelf.
The definition of geographical coordinates for areas situated 200 nautical miles from the coast aligns with the relevant provisions of the 1982 UN Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) and international customary law, following the Scientific and Technical Guidelines of the Commission on the Limits of the Continental Shelf.
This expansion has the potential to reshape the Arctic, encompassing the Arctic Circle region and the Bering Sea between Russian East Siberia and the U.S. state of Alaska, into a new focal point for tension and conflict, similar to China's claims in the South China Sea.
Mead Treadwell, former lieutenant governor of Alaska and ex-chair of the U.S. Arctic Research Commission, emphasized that decades of scientific research, numerous icebreaker missions, and detailed seafloor mapping have substantiated the U.S. claims.
Treadwell highlighted the massiveness of the recently seized region, likening it to "two Californias," adding: "America is now larger than it was yesterday."
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