ocean dumping and land-based sources of marine pollution, the Convention promotes continuing improvement in the health of the world's oceans.
In light of the essential role of marine scientific research in understanding and managing the oceans, the Convention sets forth criteria and procedures to promote access to marine areas, including coastal waters, for research activities.
The Convention facilitates solutions to the increasingly complex problems of the uses of the ocean solutions which respect the essential balance between our interests as both a coastal and a maritime nation.
Through its dispute settlement provisions, the Convention provides for mechanisms to enhance compliance by Parties with the Convention's provisions.
The Agreement fundamentally changes the deep seabed mining regime of the Convention. It meets the objections the United States and other industrialized nations previously expressed to Part XI. It promises to provide a stable and internationally recognized framework for mining to proceed in response to future demand for minerals.
The United States has been a leader in the international community's effort to develop a widely accepted international framework governing uses of the seas. As a Party to the Convention, the United States will be in a position to continue its role in this evolution and ensure solutions that respect our interests.
All interested agencies and departments, therefore, join the Department of State in unanimously recommending that the Convention and Agreement be transmitted to the Senate for its advice and consent to accession and ratification respectively. They further recommend that they be transmitted before the Senate adjourns sine die this fall.
The Department of State, along with other concerned agencies, stands ready to work with Congress toward enactment of legislation necessary to carry out the obligations assumed under the Convention and Agreement and to permit the United States to exercise rights granted by the Convention.
WARREN CHRISTOPHER
Commentary-The 1982 United Nations
Convention on the Law of the Sea and the
Agreement on Implementation of Part XI
INTRODUCTION
The United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, opened for signature on December 10, 1982 (the Convention or LOS Convention) creates a structure for the governance and protection of all of the sea, including the airspace above and the sea-bed and subsoil below. In particular, it provides a framework for the allocation of jurisdiction, rights and duties among States that carefully balances the interests of States in controlling activities off their own coasts and the interests of all States in protecting the freedom to use ocean spaces without undue interference.
This Commentary begins with a discussion of the maritime zones recognized by the Convention, emphasizing the rules regarding navigation and overflight in these areas. Next, the framework for the protection and preservation of the marine environment of these areas is examined. Thereafter, the Commentary reviews the regimes for dealing with the resources in these areas under the following headings:
Living marine resources, including fishing;
Non-living resources, including those of the continental shelf and the deep sea-bed beyond the limits of national jurisdiction; and,
Marine scientific research.
The various mechanisms for settling disputes regarding these provisions are next examined. Finally, the Commentary considers other provisions of the Convention, including those relating to maritime boundary delimitation, enclosed and semienclosed seas, land-locked and geographically disadvantaged States, and technology transfer, as well as the definitions and the general and final provisions of the Convention.
MARITIME ZONES
The Convention addresses the balance of coastal and maritime interests with respect to all areas of the sea. From the absolute sovereignty that every State exercises over its land territory and superjacent airspace, the exclusive rights and control that the coastal State exercises over maritime areas off its coast diminish in stages as the distance from the coastal State increases. Conversely, the rights and freedoms of maritime States are at their maximum in regard to activities on the high seas and gradually diminish closer to the coastal State. The balance of interests between the coastal State and maritime States thus varies in each zone recognized by the Convention.
The location of these zones under the Convention may be summarized as follows (and is illustrated in Figure 1).
Internal waters are landward of the baselines along the coast. They include lakes, rivers and many bays.
Archipelagic waters are encircled by archipelagic baselines established by independent archipelagic States.
The territorial sea extends seaward from the baselines to a fixed distance. The Convention establishes 12 nautical miles as the maximum permissible breadth of the territorial sea. (One nautical mile equals 1,852 meters or 6,067 feet; all further references to miles in this Commentary are to nautical miles.)
The contiguous zone, exclusive economic zone (EEZ) and continental shelf all begin at the seaward limit of the territorial sea.
The contiguous zone may extend to a maximum distance of 24 miles from the baselines. The EEZ may extend to a maximum distance of 200 miles from the baselines.
