Like other countries that have rectified the 1982 U.N. Convention on the Law of the Sea, Fiji can stake its claim if it produces the necessary data by May 13 this year.
The convention allows states to extend their limits beyond 200 miles if they can show that the continental shelf beyond their coastline extends that far.
With the proper scientific data, the successful claimants will be granted rights over the natural resources on and under the seabed up to 350 miles from land.
While there has been no official confirmation on Fiji’s bid, Fijilive has been reliably informed that a Maritime Affairs Coordination Committee, working under the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, is preparing an extended continental shelf claim for submission to the U.N. Commission on the Limits of the Continental Shelf.
A Fiji government consultant, a professor, is expected in the country soon to brief the MACC committee, according to an insider.
Official details are expected to be released by the Fiji government then.
The source said that under UNCLOS Article 76, Fiji is in the process of claiming continental shelf territory beyond 200 nautical miles in the South Fiji Basin area.
Extension in any other direction is limited. For instance, Fiji is bounded in the north by the 200-mile limit and in the east by the hypothetical median line between Fiji and Tonga.
However, Fijilive has been told that the outer limit of Fiji’s extended continental shelf in the region of the South Fiji Basin encloses an area of 77,827 square kilometers beyond 200 nautical miles from the territorial baseline to which Fiji can lay claim to under the convention.
For its submission to the United Nations, the insider says that Fiji’s claim must be supported by modern unambiguous legislation and modern survey data.
He said the current baseline coordinates were directly determined from British Admiralty Charts that depended upon hydrographic surveys undertaken more than 150 years ago.
Authoritative global weekly magazine, The Economist, reports that in all, about 15 million square kilometers are at stake for the 80 or so countries with realistic hopes of being able to substantiate a claim. It reports that some big claims have already been lodged: Canada is seeking 1.7m sq km and Australia 2.5m.
Eight Pacific island nations, among them Fiji, Palau and Tonga, are claiming a total of 1.5m sq km. The magazine said the claimants are not expecting new fishing rights, but the focus is chiefly on minerals.
