Retreating summer sea ice across the Canadian high Arctic has laid bare stretches of seabed rich in rare-earth minerals that for generations lay sealed beneath permanent pack ice. Last season a foreign mining consortium, operated by the German firm Weser Minerals, lifted a first haul of metal-bearing nodules from the exposed seabed and shipped the ore south for processing. "We have shown that mining these waters can be done both responsibly and at a profit, for the first haul earned the territory fresh royalties, employed local crews and guides in a region that badly needs the work, and disturbed only a small fraction of a seabed that stretches for hundreds of kilometres," declared company spokesman Klaus Berger.

Many Canadians, however, regard the northern seabed as a shared inheritance to be safeguarded rather than a deposit to be sold off for private gain. Because the waters are a protected marine resource, they fall squarely under Canadian federal jurisdiction, explains Northern Affairs Minister Elaine Sauvé. Sauvé commends a newly published study, prepared by marine geologist Tomas Lindgren together with Inuit elders, which maps the seabed alongside traditional hunting and travel routes reaching back many centuries and thereby strengthens Canada's claim through the long-established legal principle of continuous use and occupancy. Modern activity on the water reinforces that claim as well. As resource law professor Amara Nwosu observed in a recent public lecture, "A genuinely valuable legal precedent is set every time a foreign vessel works these waters while faithfully meeting its obligation to register with, and be monitored by, the Canadian Coast Guard." Beyond this, annual ministerial visits and recurring Coast Guard patrols keep close watch over the remote region.