The Law of the Sea Conference

Abstract

F OR four years now preparations have been going on for the Conference on the Law of the Sea that is to begin in Caracas this June. The total agenda is vast. It includes 25 major areas, including altogether about 90 sub-items, each of considerable complexity. These range from the law governing archaeological treasures to pirate radio; the law on pollution control to fishing limits; the breadth of the territorial sea to the law governing the continental shelf; the law governing islands to the law governing international straits. But by far the largest and probably most important issue will be the international ' regime' to be established for the deep sea-bed beyond the limits of national jurisdiction, an area never previously covered by any form of international legislation. With the partial exception of the territorial sea, there is little agreement about any of these issues at present. Few people think that it will be possible to come anywhere near agreement at one session of the cQnference, or even at two (a second session in Vienna is already envisaged for 1975). The difficulties are compounded by the fact that it has always been accepted that the issues represent a vast package. In particular there is a direct linkage between agreement on the strict law-of-the-sea issues, especially limits, and on the sea-bed regime: the Latin American countries only agreed to the conference on the basis that there would be no new agreement on limits unless there was also agreement on an international regime. But the complexities and disagreements that exist on the latter subject are if anything even greater than those surrounding the limits, which are themselves sufficiently large. So the probability is not of a short sharp conference ending with all signing on the dotted line; but of something like a decade of negotiations, manoeuvring and controversy over this vast range of issues. It may, however, be worth attempting at this stage to survey the main issues to be discussed and considering the differences of interest and viewpoint which have emerged on them during the four years of negotiations preceding the conference. Of the legal issues, perhaps the simplest, as well as that which is closest to agreement, concerns the breadth of the territorial sea. Since the two conferences in 1958 and 1960, there has been a general widening of claims to this area. The most extreme are those claiming a limit