- Denmark hopes to find evidence that the Danish territory
of Greenland is connected to a ridge beneath the floating ice of the Arctic
Ocean, thus giving Denmark claim to the north pole - and whatever riches
in oil and gas may lie beneath it.
-
- "Maybe there is a chance that the north pole could
become Danish," Helge Sander, the science and technology minister,
said yesterday. "We must be able to argue that it is a natural extension
[of Greenland]", added Trine Dahl-Jensen of the Geological Survey
of Denmark and Greenland.
-
- Greenland, the world's biggest island, is a semi-independent
Danish territory whose northern tip is 500 miles south of the pole.
-
- Denmark has joined Canada and Russia in charting the
Arctic sea bed in an effort to claim ownership of the expanse.
-
- The question Danish scientists must resolve is where
Greenland's continental shelf ends and the ocean bed begins. Beneath the
pole, a 1,250-mile underwater ridge runs between Greenland and Siberia;
measurements would have to prove that the Greenland shelf is attached to
the Lomonosov ridge.
-
- Another factor is a 1986 UN convention that allows countries
an economic zone extending 230 miles from their shores. Only countries
that have ratified the convention can claim zones; Norway, Russia and Canada
have signed, the United States has not.
-
- Denmark's parliament is due to ratify it before the end
of the year, though an exact date had not been set, Mr Sander said.
-
- Since spring, Danish scientists have used sonar, seismographs
and GPS data to survey the ridge and have drilled in search of resources.
-
- Canada and Russia, which are also likely to claim ownership
of the ridge, are making similar investigations.
-
- Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited
2004 http://www.guardian.co.uk/international/story/0,3604,1318107,00.html
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