Current interest in arctic development gives special urgency to US need to ratify UNCLOS

The activity related to Arctic claims suggests an urgency for U.S. accession to the Convention. This urgency is driven both by what the United States can do and what it can undo as a party to the Convention. While we currently can comment on proposals by other Convention nations⁹, accession to the treaty would give the United States standing to substantially modify or block proposals that the U.S. found detrimental to its national interests. This could be done by preparing its own claim to the Continental Shelf Commission, or by working cooperatively with other Arctic nations to develop logical rules to govern exploitation of resources and other uses of the Arctic Sea. This latter strategy reflects one of the biggest benefits of U.S. accession to the Convention-namely that it would generate goodwill and a sense of cooperation over a shared mission to responsibly use the resources of the sea while protecting the oceanic environment for generations to come.