Oh I agree entirely; the current political context is authoritarian and nationalistic in Russia and I'm sure that their claim is not for benevolent reasons (which is part of the reason I linked the article... this is serious stuff, even if a quite distant to me!).
The justification of the Russian claim (continential principle) in my mind has slightly stronger justification than the sectoral principle which is also sometimes used. The debate over the Timor Sea was a similar issue.
Wikipedia has a neat summary of the various claims:
no subject
Oh I agree entirely; the current political context is authoritarian and nationalistic in Russia and I'm sure that their claim is not for benevolent reasons (which is part of the reason I linked the article... this is serious stuff, even if a quite distant to me!).
The justification of the Russian claim (continential principle) in my mind has slightly stronger justification than the sectoral principle which is also sometimes used. The debate over the Timor Sea was a similar issue.
Wikipedia has a neat summary of the various claims:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Territorial_claims_in_the_Arctic