Canada's influence over Arctic wanes as global interest grows: sovereignty expert

The growing worldwide interest in exploring the Arctic will lessen Canada's influence over what happens there, says a northern historian and sovereignty expert.

That quickly emerging interest among many nations — brought on by global warming, the thawing of frozen sea routes, and a race to claim lucrative energy resources — has prompted NATO officials meeting in Iceland on Thursday to say NATO will have a military presence in the North.

"This transition in the last very short while has been quite stunning," Ken Coates, history professor and dean of arts at Ontario's University of Waterloo, told CBC News on Thursday.

"Countries that previously paid very little attention to the Arctic, organizations that basically passed it over fairly quickly, are now realizing that global warming and the disappearance of the Arctic ice is going to have profound geopolitical implications."

'There will be a military presence': NATO chief

NATO commanders and lawmakers meeting in Reykjavik this week said the Arctic thaw is bringing the prospect of new standoffs between powerful nations.

"I would be the last one to expect military conflict, but there will be a military presence," NATO Secretary-General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer told reporters on Thursday.

"It should be a military presence that is not overdone, and there is a need for political co-operation and economic co-operation."

The NATO chief said a surge in energy exploration — and the likelihood of more commercial ships needing emergency rescue — would require a larger NATO presence in the Arctic.

The opening of Arctic sea routes also threatens to complicate delicate relations between countries with competing claims to Arctic territory, particularly as exploration for oil and natural gas becomes possible in once-inaccessible areas.

De Hoop Scheffer said negotiations involving Russia, NATO and other nations will be key to preventing a future conflict. The NATO chief is expected to meet Russian Deputy Prime Minister Sergei Ivanov next week for talks.

The United States, Russia and Canada are among the countries attempting to claim jurisdiction over Arctic territory alongside Nordic nations.

Analysts say China is also likely to join a rush to capture energy reserves.

"Several Arctic rim countries are strengthening their capabilities, and military activity in the High North region has been steadily increasing," de Hoop Scheffer told delegates.

Canada a 'second-tier' nation

Coates, a former Yukoner, said Canada has not done enough to assert its sovereignty over the Arctic, and as a result will have little influence over what happens there in the future.

"Now all of a sudden, NATO's getting involved, the European Union's expressing an interest [and] we'll have Asian countries be more concerned because of the shipping questions," Coates said.

"Canada is no longer one of the four or five major players. It's now one of the second-tier countries that's sort of trying to make its point in a much larger political forum."

He added that Canada's military could not compete with powers like Russia, so Canada would need support from the U.S. to have any influence on the Arctic world stage.

"The Americans have actually always been relatively collaborative," he said.

"We have in this country a tendency to describe the Americans in rather colonial imperialistic terms, and in fact in Arctic developments the Americans have always typically asked for more Canadian input than we've been willing to put in place."

Russia and Canada have already traded verbal shots over each other's intentions in the Arctic, and Canada has beefed up its military presence in the region, announcing plans to build a new army training centre and a deep-water port in contested Arctic waters.

Norway, the U.S. and Denmark also have claims in the vast region, while Russian President Dmitry Medvedev seeks to lay claim to Arctic territory the size of France.