CYIL Vol. 5, 2014

JAN ONDŘEJ CYIL 5 ȍ2014Ȏ refers to Article 1 of the Geneva Convention on the Continental Shelf 54 of 1958. The Court stated that this article represented customary international law, 55 even though it used the term the natural prolongation , while in the Convention of 1958 the definition uses the formulation submarine areas adjacent to the coast . The concept of the natural prolongation of the land territory, in the judgment on Continental Shelf of 1969, however, was not acceptable for those states that do not have a seabed as the natural prolongation of the land territory during the Third United Nations Conference on the Law of the Sea. These states would like to exercise jurisdiction over the seabed in the proximity of the shore and over the natural resources that can be found there. These states argued a fixed limit for the continental shelf 56 should be set. The states that already exercised jurisdiction on the basis of natural prolongation beyond the most likely limit of 200 nautical miles were against this. These states included Great Britain, the USA, and the USSR, which possessed a continental shelf beyond the 200 nautical miles limit and were not willing to renounce their claims to the resources 57 in these more distant parts of their continental shelf. The dispute was solved by compromise 58 in Article 76 of the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea of 1982. According to Article 76 of the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea of 1982: „the continental shelf of a coastal State comprises the seabed and subsoil of the submarine areas that extend beyond its territorial sea throughout the natural prolongation of its land territory to the outer edge of the continental margin, or to a distance of 200 nautical miles from the baselines from which the breadth of the territorial sea is measured where the outer edge of the continental margin does not extend up to that distance“. As Churchill and Lowe 59 state, this legal definition is different from the geological definition. Parts of the sea that lie beyond the physical continental shelf are included in the distance of 200 nautical miles from the shore. This provision is today considered customary international law. 60 Article 76, however, also defines the outer edge of the continental shelf , where the continental margin extends beyond the 200 nautical miles limit. According to Article 76, paragraph 3 the continental margin comprises the submerged prolongation of the land mass of the coastal state and consists of the seabed and subsoil of the shelf, the slope and the rise . It does not include the deep ocean floor with its oceanic ridges or the subsoil thereof. According to Article 76, paragraph 2 of the Convention, the continental shelf of a coastal State shall not extend beyond the limits provided for in paragraphs 4 54 The text of the Convention is available in Czech as Úmluva vyhl. č. 114/1964 Sb. The Convention on the Continental Shelf from 1958 defines the continental shelf as “the seabed and subsoil of the submarine areas adjacent to the coast but outside the area of the territorial sea, to a depth of 200m.” 55 Churchill, R. R. and Lowe, A. V., op. cit. , p. 147. 56 Evans, M. D. (editor), op. cit. , p. 642. 57 Churchill, R. R. and Lowe, A. V., op. cit ., p. 148. 58 Evans, M., D. (editor), op. cit. , p. 642. 59 Churchill, R. R. and Lowe, A. V., op. cit. , p. 148. 60 Ibid.

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