ABSTRACT
Russia places a high strategic priority on the Arctic from a security perspective, inview of the need to secure the Northern Sea Route as well as develop natural resources in the region. The Russian government plans to resubmit its application to the UN Commission on the Limits of the Continental Shelf (CLCS) for an extension of the current limits of the Russian continental shelf under the terms of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS).1 One of the purposes of the expedition to the North Pole in August 2007, during which a submersible planted a titanium tube containing the Russian flag on the seabed, was to emphasise Moscow’s claim that the Russian portion of the continental shelf stretched as far as the North Pole. From the perspective of securing Russian interests in the Arctic, this expedition clarified the government’s strategic focus on the Arctic, and it is drawing up a longterm national strategy with respect to Arctic issues. It is thought that Russia has begun to view the Arctic and the Far East regions as one strategic theatre joined by the newly emerging Northern Sea Route.
