Remarks by Permanent Representative Vassily Nebenzia on a GA draft resolution on the Conservation and Sustainable Use of Marine Biological Diversity of Areas beyond National Jurisdiction
Mr. President,
Our position regarding the Agreement on Marine Biodiversity is well known. Russia has no intention of becoming a party to this agreement.
In this regard, we would like to distance ourselves from the consensus on the draft resolution that has just been adopted. We are grateful to the coordinators for their constructive approach and for incorporating amendments to the text, which made it possible this time for us to dissociate ourselves rather than call for a vote.
The Russian delegation respects the positions of developing countries – many of them have pinned great hopes to this international agreement. However, we are bound to urge them to demonstrate due diligence and pragmatism on this issue.
We continue to believe that the Agreement in its current form poses risks to the legal regime established on the basis of the 1982 United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, the 1995 Agreement on Straddling Fish Stocks and the activities of relevant international bodies and organizations, including the International Seabed Authority and regional fisheries management organizations and arrangements. The agreement provides for a mechanism to establish marine protected areas in the World Ocean exclusively on the basis of some political decision without proper scientific research – and this may entail abuse and unsubstantiated restrictions of the rights, freedoms and legitimate interests of States in the high seas.
Collecting basic data to establish a single marine protected area is extremely costly, we are not even talking about constant subsequent monitoring of the effectiveness of management and conservation measures. Furthermore, the Agreement failed to provide for a stable financing mechanism. All key activities are hinged on the only one external financial source – the Global Environment Fund. This is in fact a private entity, and the Parties to the Agreement have no control over it. Thus, strategic priorities will be set not by the Parties to the Agreement but by the Fund that will be authorized to decide on the areas of work to finance. By the way, it is no coincidence that its funds are now being allocated for countries to swiftly ratify the Agreement. Countries are being actively lured into a new legal instrument with unclear range of rights and obligations.
For example, the prospects for distributing the benefits from the use of marine genetic resources are very opaque, since the issue of intellectual property, which is crucial here, was left out of the Agreement. However, what is quite possible here is the risks that there will never be any distribution of benefits from the use of mineral resources in the international deep seabed, since the Agreement on Marine Biodiversity may well disrupt the work of the International Seabed Authority.
The same is true with regard to other rights and freedoms at sea: navigation, fishery, marine scientific research – now everybody can participate in this on equal footing. After the Agreement enters into force, only a narrow group of States will be able to harness those rights and freedoms. This group will justify their exclusive position by the fact that they possess advanced “clean” and “green” technologies. The others will not have access to such technologies. The weak and vague provisions of the Technology Transfer Agreement do not provide developing countries with any guarantees in this regard.
We would call on all States to carefully consider the ratification of this instrument and thoughtfully weigh up the tangible risks and elusive benefits. We are convinced that the artificially whipped-up haste around this issue is beneficial to developed countries and big businesses, but in no way to the developing world.
What gives us additional food for thought is the recent disclosures about the scale of funding through USAID for the commissioned and politicized activities of supposedly independent NGOs and media outlets. Among the recipients of the grants were “green” and “climate” players who actively provided consulting services to the States involved in the development of the Agreement on Marine Biological Diversity. And now we know for sure that this was certainly not done for selfless reasons.
Thank you.
