Govt. to reconstitute National Oceanic Affairs Committee to identify Sri Lanka’s continental shelf

With a view to establishing outer limits with supporting evidence for the formation of Sri Lanka’s continental shelf, the Government has decided to call for expressions of intent for the reconstitution of the National Oceanic Affairs Committee.

The proposal tabled by Foreign Affairs Minister Ali Sabry was approved by the Cabinet of Ministers at its meeting on Tuesday.

In 2009, Sri Lanka submitted technical and scientific data and other information to the Commission on the Limits of the Continental Shelf for the establishment of the outer limits of the continental shelf beyond Sri Lanka’s Exclusive Economic Zone of 200 nautical miles under the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea.

Later, the commission appointed a sub-commission to consider Sri Lanka’s entitlements.

The National Ocean Affairs Committee under the Ministry of Foreign Affairs has been established with Cabinet approval to work with this sub-committee to identify the limits of the continental shelf claimed by Sri Lanka.

The continental shelf is one of the maritime zones which consist of numerous rich mineral deposits, oil, gas and fisheries. The commercial value attached to this particular zone is gigantic. In consequence, every State tries to extend their continental margin in order to exploit and grab as much as it can make out of it.

According to UN laws, a country can have continental shelf rights up to 350 nm or 100 nm from the 2,500 metres depth, which is higher.

The Sri Lankan submission to the Commission on the Limits of the Continental Shelf (CLCS) in May 2009 is made in accordance with Paragraph 8 of the Article 76 of the Law of the Sea Convention (LOSC) and Article 3 of Annex 2 of the Convention. Since the Statement of Understanding (SOU) does not make any reference to the States which can be made submissions to CLCS states like Kenya, Myanmar and Bangladesh have made their claims to extend their continental margin based on the SOU.

Sri Lankan submission overlaps with India, Myanmar and Bangladesh to a greater extent. It is noted that Myanmar and Bangladesh have settled their dispute concerning the delimitation of the maritime boundary in the Bay of Bengal, according to the judgment delivered on 14 March 2012 by the International Tribunal on the Law of the Sea.

In the matter of the Bay of Bengal Maritime Boundary Arbitration between Bangladesh and the Republic of India, an award was made on July 2014 in favour of Bangladesh. Accordingly, the maritime disputes of the three main countries in the Bay of Bengal have now been settled and international oil companies are showing a keen interest to carry out exploration and production operations in these countries leaving Sri Lanka with serious delays in settling our maritime boundary in the east under Annex 11 of the final Act of UNCLOS.

But Sri Lanka from its baseline claimed about 1,000 nautical miles, which is India and Bangladesh’s continental shelf territory.

Research findings show that there are disputes among States in the process of extending their outer limits of the continental margin.

Thus they recommend the importance of the negotiation process is highly important in respect of maintaining good diplomatic relationships among countries.