I am sure that we are all grateful to my hon. Friend for that update, and that we are all alarmed, if not surprised, by that development.
In addition to the treaty signatories, we now have “other consultative parties”, such as Brazil, China, India, Germany, Italy, Holland, Finland, Sweden, Spain, and even Ecuador, Uruguay, Peru, Bulgaria, Poland and South Korea. There are also other “non-consultative parties”, including Austria, Belarus, Canada, Colombia, Cuba and the Czech Republic. I will not read them all out, Mr Deputy Speaker, but suffice it to say that plenty of other countries are also involved on a non-consultative basis.
The treaty parties meet each year at the Antarctic treaty consultative meeting, for the purpose of consulting and exchanging information on matters of common interest pertaining to Antarctica. The reasons for the treaty were competing territorial ambitions—my hon. Friend the Member for Romford (Andrew Rosindell) made much mention of those—and claims by various countries, including the UK, that sometimes overlapped each other. At the same time, Antarctic scientific research was becoming more important, which encouraged the need for the negotiation of a peaceful agreement establishing spheres of interest and the permanent presence of national
teams conducting scientific research. The UK made its first territorial claim in 1908 and has had a permanent presence since 1943. As my hon. Friend the Member for Stroud said, our zone of presence is called the British Antarctic Territory, which was established to provide survey and meteorological information in the south Atlantic ocean—this is known as the British Antarctic Survey. The BAT is administered by the Foreign and Commonwealth Office and, as I am sure we all know, it is located in the coldest and windiest part of the Antarctic and it has no indigenous population.
The main objectives of the treaty can be defined as follows: to demilitarise Antarctica; to establish it as a zone free of nuclear tests and the disposal of radioactive waste; and to ensure that it is used for peaceful purposes only. That is set out in the introduction to the Antarctic treaty 1959, which states:
“Recognizing that it is in the interest of all mankind that Antarctica shall continue for ever to be used exclusively for peaceful purposes and shall not become the scene or object of international discord”.
Nuclear explosions and the disposal of radioactive material are prohibited under article V(1). However, article V(2) states:
“In the event of the conclusion of international agreements concerning the use of nuclear energy, including nuclear explosions and the disposal of radioactive waste material”—
by—
“all of the Contracting Parties...the rules established under such agreements shall apply in Antarctica.”
Although, hypothetically, this might be allowed and executable, it is rather unlikely that all the parties to the treaty would agree on such actions at the same time.
The second objective is to promote international scientific co-operation in Antarctica, which we have heard quite a lot about today, so I will not dwell on that. The third objective is to set aside disputes over territorial sovereignty. The treaty preserves the incompatible views regarding territory that my hon. Friend the Member for Romford spoke about earlier, but prevents any action from being taken to create, extend, support or deny claims to territorial sovereignty. All these factors make the governance of Antarctica slightly more complex than anywhere else in the world. It is important to say that the treaty is already in force indefinitely.
As with other international treaties and agreements that have been adopted by a large number of states, more than 300 recommendations have been adopted by the Antarctic treaty parties which negotiated separate international agreements, of which three are still in use. These three treaties are collectively known as the Antarctic treaty system—ATS. The three international agreements are the convention for the conservation of Antarctic seals 1972, the convention on the conservation of Antarctic marine living resources 1980, and the protocol on environmental protection to the Antarctic treaty 1991. I will come to each of these separately.
What is important to all these agreements is the geography of Antarctica, to which my hon. Friend the Member for Stroud referred at the beginning of his remarks. He pointed out that the Antarctic was about one and a half times the size of the USA. It is also one and a third times the size of Europe. It is a huge area, bigger than China and India combined. The Antarctic icecap contains 90% of the ice on earth. It is almost
impossible to live there, but Antarctica is well known for its biodiversity, which is one of the reasons why my hon. Friend is so keen on the Bill—whales, seals, mammals, emperor penguins, albatross, vertebrates and microscopic organisms are well adapted to the cold climate. In contrast with the Arctic tundra, the Antarctic tundra lacks large mammal fauna.
According to the convention on the conservation of Antarctic marine living resources, the first Antarctic marine living resources to be exploited were fur seals and elephant seals early in the 19th century. Subsequently great whales were hunted in Antarctic waters. Most, if not all, Southern ocean whales are migratory. They head into warmer waters during the Antarctic winter and the calves are born in these more hospitable seas, as they would struggle to survive in polar waters during their first few months. No native bird or mammal may be killed or captured without a licence from the competent authority. Thanks to the British Antarctic Survey, I know a great deal more about seals than I did before, but given that time is pressing, I will not indulge the House by passing on some of the facts that I learned about seals, but I commend my hon. Friends to read them.