http://en.rian.ru/russia/20080917/116894260.html
Arctic resources central to Russia's energy security - Medvedev - 2
17:49 | 17/ 09/ 2008
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(Adds quotes, background info in paras 4-5, 8-16)
MOSCOW, September 17 (RIA Novosti) - The Russian president said
Wednesday that the use of Arctic resources was central to the country's
energy security.
"According to estimates by experts, the Arctic shelf may have about
one-fourth of the world's shelf hydrocarbon reserves, and the use of
these reserves is a guarantee of Russia's overall energy security,"
Dmitry Medvedev said at a Russian Security Council session.
He also said Russia's competitiveness on global markets depended on
Arctic resources, stressing the need to adopt a law establishing the
frontiers of Russia's Arctic zone.
"We need a firm normative-legal base regulating Russia's activity in the
Arctic. First of all the federal law on the southern border of Russia's
arctic zone should be completed and adopted," he said.
Medvedev also said that Russia would next look to establish "the
external frontier of the continental shelf."
"This is a very important task," he said.
The Russian leader said about 20% of Russia's GDP and 22% of national
exports were produced in the Arctic.
"Our first and main task is to turn the Arctic into Russia's resource
base of the 21st century," Medvedev said, adding that a whole number of
problems, including the protection of Russia's national interests in the
region, needed to be solved.
Medvedev also said a priority task for Russia was the modernization of
the transport infrastructure in the north of the country.
He said that "roads and air links" had deteriorated in the post-Soviet
period, adding that the absence of "modern river and sea ports," plus
the "dilapidation of the fleet, including icebreakers," was "a tangible
obstacle in implementing the rich investment potential of the Arctic."
Medvedev criticized the irrational use of resources in Russia's northern
regions.
The secretary of the Russian Security Council, Nikolai Patrushev, said
Wednesday the government was to draft the fundamentals of Russian state
policy in the Arctic by December 1.
"We should defend our interests, but we understand that Canada, Norway,
Denmark and the U.S., as well as Russia, will defend their interests,"
Patrushev said.
Russia has undertaken two Arctic expeditions - to the Mendeleyev
underwater chain in 2005 and to the Lomonosov ridge last summer - to
back Russian claims to the region.
The area is believed to contain vast oil and gas reserves and other
mineral riches, likely to become accessible in future decades due to
man-made global warming.
Russia said earlier it would submit documentary evidence to the UN of
the external boundaries of the Russian Federation's territorial shelf in
2009.
Under international law, the five Arctic Circle countries - the U.S.,
Canada, Denmark, Norway and Russia - each currently have a 322-kilometer
(200-mile) economic zone in the Arctic Ocean.
