INUIT AND THE NUNAVUT LAND CLAIMS AGREEMENT ...

Nunavut Land Claims Agreement
(NLCA) — the only modern treaty to
specifically mention Arctic sovereignty
— to bolster Canada’s Arctic sovereignty.
Canada has a tradition of asserting
Arctic sovereignty primarily in reaction
to assumed and real challenges: The
unwelcome voyages through the
Northwest Passage of SS Manhattan in
1969 and 1970, and the US Coast Guard
icebreaker Polar Sea in 1985 readily
come to mind. Promises made in the
heat of sovereignty challenges to build
a Polar Class 8 icebreaker and deploy a
subsurface surveillance system across
the passage from Cornwallis Island to
Somerset Island were abandoned as too
expensive when the media and public
interest moved on to other issues.
In August 2007 two Russian minisubmarines
planted a titanium Russian
flag on the floor of the Arctic Ocean at
the North Pole, symbolically claiming
sovereignty over the seabed northward
of Russia’s 200-nautical-mile exclusive
economic zone. Responding to vivid
images on the television, Peter MacKay,
then minister of foreign affairs and
international trade, dismissed this as
“just a show.” Perhaps it was, but when
responding he confused two issues:
international shipping rights, if any, in
the Northwest Passage, and extension
by rim states of their continental shelf
rights deep in the Arctic Ocean through
a process defined in the United Nations
Convention on the Law of the Sea
(UNCLOS). His over-the-top characterization
of Russia’s action as reminiscent
of how states acted in the 15 th century
was not balanced by an announcement
on an alternative Canadian approach.
More embarrassment followed. It
was revealed in The Globe and Mail in
August 2007 that Canada was relying
upon a Russian icebreaker as the plat-
Inuit and the Nunavut Land Claims Agreement: supporting Canada’s Arctic sovereignty
form from which to collect data to
support its own Arctic Ocean continental
shelf submission. In response,
Rob Huebert of the University of
Calgary pithily commented, “If you’re
building a court case, do you depend
on the opposing side for the sources of
your argument?”
Far from being a wilderness untrammeled by people, the
Arctic is known, named and used by Inuit — Canadian
citizens — and by a small but growing number of arrivals
from the south. Inuit trace their use of this region back
thousands of years through Thule, Dorset and Pre-Dorset
peoples.
Jacob Verhoef, the head of Canada’s
scientific data collection effort, warned
that Canada’s submission, due by 2013,
10 years after Canada ratified UNCLOS,
might be lacking. It seemed that Canada
was now paying the price for failing to
build the Polar Class 8 icebreaker and for
delays in starting data collection to support
its claim. Had Canada thought
ahead when, in the mid-1990s, decisions
were taken to ratify UNCLOS at some
time in the future? Apparently not.
Generally there has been a warm
response in the North as well as
nationally to the Prime Minister’s
commitment to assert Canada’s Arctic
sovereignty, although what’s at stake is
poorly understood, and some worry
that sovereignty assertion through
navy patrol vessels signals the remilitarization
of the North.
Numerous commentators have
pressed the Government of Canada to
modernize and expand Canada’s fleet
of icebreakers and to use the coast
guard rather than the navy for Arctic
sovereignty assertion. But it was the
Prime Minister himself who revealed
the reasoning as well as the intent of
the Government of Canada in July
2007 when he announced the Arctic
patrol ships and deepwater port:
“Canada has a choice when it comes to
defending our sovereignty over the
Arctic. We either use it or lose it. And
make no mistake, this Government
intends to use it.”
But this is simply wrong. Far from
being a wilderness unoccupied by people,
the Arctic is known, named and
used by Inuit — Canadian citizens —
and by a small but growing number of
arrivals from the south. Inuit trace
their use of this region back thousands
of years through Thule, Dorset and
Pre-Dorset peoples.
Canadian Inuit and
Canada’s Arctic sovereignty
have invariably been
linked. In the 1950s Inuit
families from northern
Quebec were relocated to
Resolute on Cornwallis
Island and Grise Fiord on
Ellesmere Island. While the reasons for
this relocation have been hotly debated,
sovereignty assertion is thought by
many to be one reason for the move.
In 1970 a Canadian Inuit hunter and
dog team from Resolute stood boldly
in front of SS Manhattan as it plowed
through pack ice on its historic voyage
— it stopped. A point had been made.
The Arctic Waters Pollution
Prevention Act — Canada’s prime
response to the Manhattan incident —
invoked the need to protect the environment
upon which Inuit depended
out to 100 miles from the coast. In 1985
Inuvialuit as well as Canadian nationalists
from the south were on board a
small plane that buzzed the Polar Sea
dropping politically charged notes from
the sky politely but firmly reminding
the crew of Canada’s Arctic sovereignty.
In the aftermath of the Polar Sea incident
the late Mark R. Gordon, an Inuit
leader from northern Quebec, said Inuit
would hold up the Canadian flag in the
Arctic. And still today Inuit leaders
remain fully supportive of Canada’s
Arctic sovereignty. Mary Simon,
President of Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami, the
national Inuit organization, conducted
a Canada-wide tour late in 2007 to
engage and inform Canadians on Arctic
sovereignty and to gain public support
for Inuit involvement in this issue.
The geographical extent of Inuit land
and resource use in the Arctic has
been well known for many years. In 1973
POLICY OPTIONS
DECEMBER 2007-JANUARY 2008
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