UK files claim to seabed around the Falklands

[Judi Lynn]

Source: Washington Post/Reuters

UK files claim to seabed around the Falklands
By Adrian Croft
Reuters
Monday, May 11, 2009; 3:47 PM

LONDON (Reuters) - Britain lodged a claim to a large swath of South Atlantic seabed around the Falkland Islands on Monday, setting the stage for a battle with Argentina for control of potentially rich oil and gas reserves in the area.

The dispute over mineral rights could further embitter a long-running row between Britain and Argentina over sovereignty over the islands, known as the Malvinas in Spanish, which led to war in 1982.

Britain filed its claim to an extensive area of seabed around the Falkland Islands, South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands to the United Nations Commission on the Limits of the Continental Shelf, British officials said.

The claim covers an area of about 1.2 million sq km (463,300 square miles), according to Lindsay Parson of Britain's National Oceanography Center, who helped prepare the filing.

Argentina filed its own claim with the U.N. commission last month which encompasses the same area claimed by Britain.



Read more: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/05/11/AR2009051102358.html

[Baby Snooks]

1. BP must have found oil.....

Coming soon. Another war for oil. Argentina of course will lose.

[Igel]

4. I'm not sure that they've found it.

I know that a lot of people suspect there's a lot there.

My hunch is that Britain's filing is simply a response to Argentina's filing, CYA just in case. (There are other reasons to file, of course: Fishing comes to mind.)

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/markets/marketreport/2785816/The-Falklands-Will-there-be-oil.html

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/6571431.stm

[xchrom]

2. let it go, britain -- let it go. nt

[MGKrebs]

3. I hope this can be resolved peacefully.

[No Elephants]

5. Ah, Britannia, still colonizing after all these years.

:puke:

[muriel_volestrangler]

6. This was in response to the Argentine claim

If Britain hadn't made it, then Argentina's claim to the sea right around the Falklands would have been unopposed, and might have been granted. It's not 'colonizing' to keep the rights to the sea around an island populated entirely by people who want to stay British.

[Posteritatis]

7. All of the "Falklands for the Argentinians!" folks seem to forget that little detail (nt)

[No Elephants]

8. We disagree. Assuming you are correct about "populated ENTIRELY," that

population is there solely because the UK colonized the Malvinas.

"An Argentine foreign ministry statement said Great Britain had usurped the islands in 1833, illegally occupying Argentine territory, and that Britain had ignored calls by the UN to begin discussions over the issue. "

BTW, why is supposedly not "colonizing" for the UK to claim sovereignty over the waters off the coast of islands off the coast of Argentina?

http://www.thefreedictionary.com/colonization


The article says that Argentina's claim is backed by 11 years of scientific research and by being, well, Argentina, the country to which the Malvinas actually belonged and, arguably still belong morally. The UK is backed by an alleged preference of colonials?

So, what exactly would be wrong with leaving unopposed the claim of a nation to the waters off its coast? At most, the UK could have negotiated some swimming and personal fishing rights. Maybe not, though. Maybe the colonials should pay for using Argentina's natural resources.

Maybe the UK should return the Malvinas. Heck, works of art wrongfully appropriated from Jews during WW II get returned to descendants, even if a museum or private party acquired them without knowing their history and paying full price. Why not misappropriated islands?

Maybe the UK, Argentina and the colonials should negotiate a treaty.

Maybe I am biased because I am just so sick of the world's having had to deal for centuries with the aftermath of the rule of colonizers, from Ireland to Scotland to India to the Middle East to aboriginals in Austrailia to original Americans in what is now the U.S. (probably Canada s well) to South Africa to the Falklands, many of them British colonizers.

Seems as though we are never going to get out from under the fallout of their arrogance, avaricious exploitation and soul-numbing brutality.

Take up the white man's burden, my ass.

[muriel_volestrangler]

9. The Falklands had no native population at all

European countries, including Britain, 'colonised' it before Argentina was even an independent country.

Morally, the islands belong to the people who live there. I'm amazed you think the claims of 19th century politicians in Buenos Aires, over which bits of land should be annexed to their new country, should take precedence over families who have lived there for generations.

You really want to compare this to stolen WW2 art? Aren't you cheapening the suffering of the Jews a bit by doing that?

[HarukaTheTrophyWife]

10. Oh England, is there nothing you won't steal