Russia leads race for North Pole oil

In the darkest depths of the Arctic Ocean a new Cold War is brewing. American and British nuclear submarines lurk in the shadows, preparing for company.

‘Why has Britain been sending submarines into Arctic waters?’ asked Rob Huebert, associate director of the Centre for Military and Strategic Studies in Calgary. ‘Because it wants to retain its capability to deal with the Russian threat.’
Such talk is redolent of a Le Carre novel. But the battle between the West and Russia over who owns the Arctic has been building for years. Last week it entered a new phase when Russia announced it was sending a miniature submarine, equipped with a team of explorers, to claim a chunk of the Arctic Ocean the size of Western Europe.

The stakes are high. The ocean is home to vast oil and mineral reserves as well as massive shoals of fish and strategically important shipping lanes. ‘It could get very ugly,’ Huebert said. ‘Nobody knows how much oil and gas is down there. Shell, for example, is quite pessimistic, but the likes of Exxon are quite gung-ho. I’ve seen some people make the case that up to 18 per cent of the world’s oil reserves are there – that’s getting into Saudi Arabia’s league.’

To symbolise its claim, Russia will plant its flag on the sea bed before taking samples it believes will prove the Lomonosov Ridge, which runs underneath the Arctic Ocean, is an extension of the Siberian continental shelf and therefore Russian territory.

So far the US has refused to engage in the debate over extending exploitation rights, a policy throwback to the Eighties when the Reagan administration feared such an action would see large parts of the Arctic handed over to the Soviets.

Meanwhile, Canada and Denmark, through its sovereignty over Greenland, claim that the Lomonosov Ridge is connected to their territories and therefore the ocean is effectively their property. In a sign of how tense the situation is becoming, the Canadian government recently placed a C$7bn (