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Beaufort dispute boiling over
The Canadian government has filed a formal protest with Washington over Alaska’s plans to auction exploration rights in a disputed portion of the Beaufort Sea and is being urged to raise the issue at the highest levels.
Canadian Foreign Affairs officials acknowledged Nov. 24 that a diplomatic note was filed in April after the U.S. and Alaska governments issued a draft version of exploration leases covering about 5,400 square miles of a long-contested portion of the Beaufort along an extension of the Alaska-Yukon land border.
The disclosure was made after Dennis Bevington, a Member of Parliament for the Western Arctic and a northern affairs spokesman for the New Democratic Party, accused the U.S. of making an “incursion” into Canadian territory.
He said the Canadian government of Prime Minister Stephen Harper had failed to take adequate action and prodded Harper to “bring this up at the highest level within diplomatic circles with the United States.”
“If permits are given in the disputed area, those should immediately be taken to the international courts for intervention,” Bevington said.
He said Canada was negligent in protecting the southern tip of the contested portion of the Beaufort.
Difference in where border lies Canada has viewed the Beaufort dividing line as an extension of the Yukon’s western boundary, following the 141st parallel into the sea.
But the U.S. has insisted the border should be redrawn to run perpendicular to the coast, moving the line eastward.
Alaska has said it will proceed with offering leases in the wedge-shaped area, while suggesting the auction might even force the two countries to settle the dispute.
Alaska state oil and gas Director Kevin Banks was reported by the Canadian Broadcasting Corp. as saying that “if the tract were leased in this lease sale … Obviously, we can’t sell land that doesn’t belong to us and so there would actually be something the Canadian government and the U.S. government and the State of Alaska would have to discuss.”
The state has notified potential bidders they should be prepared for possible delays in determining title to any leased land.
In a technical report related to the Beaufort areawide sale, Alaska said the U.S. Department of State had notified the state “that the title and submerged land within Tract 001 of the lease sale may be subject to a title dispute with the government of Canada.”
The Canadian government has not indicated what steps it might take to either block the sale of oil and gas permits, or seek a resolution of the 30-year-old issue.
—Gary Park
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