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CHAPTER 4 - POST-COLD WAR COOPERATION IN THE ARCTIC:
FROM INTERSTATE CONFLICT TO NEW AGENDAS FOR SECURITY

In the past, the circumpolar Arctic was dominated by defence needs-a policy arena in which Canada played only a minor role. Today this region is emerging as a venue in which all facets of foreign policy can be exercised, if we have sufficient imagination. Sustainable development and environmental security promise to be the policy touchstones in the circumpolar Arctic well into the next century.
"Sovereignty, Security, and Surveillance in the Arctic"85

The key difference between then and now is that there are no enemies to confront across the artificial "East-West divide" in the Arctic, which again was largely acreation - and now a legacy - of the Cold War. The old threat perceptions having become more or less redundant, the dividing line between military security and civil security is much less blurred now than it could ever be during the Cold War.
Sanjay Chaturvedi86

Arctic Security in Transition between Past and Future

Security concerns have traditionally focussed on the protection of nation-states and their sovereignty; "security" was commonly seen as synonymous with "defence," resulting in a focus on military-technical considerations.87 In the Arctic, security concerns during the Cold War focussed on the region's location between the superpowers, with the Soviet Union basing its most powerful ballistic missile submarine forces on the largely ice-free Kola peninsula near Norway, and the U.S. seeing the region as a "northern flank" to be defended through an aggressive Maritime Strategy. As Dr. John Heap of Cambridge University's Scott Polar Research Institute put it to the Committee, a "superpower permafrost" covered the region. The end of the Cold War has resulted in revolutionary changes in the international security situation, which have had important implications for the Arctic as a region. The most obvious and of these changes has been the end of the global military confrontation between the United States and Russia, but the deeper change has been a rethinking of the nature of security. Discussions of security should now focus on the political more than the military aspects of the relations between states, and the past several years have seen a broadened understanding which recognizes these non-military factors.

Following wide-ranging public hearings in 1994, the Special Joint Committee Reviewing Canadian Foreign Policy called for "a broader concept of security." 88 The Government agreed, and in its February 1995 foreign policy statement Canada in the World, developed the concept of "shared human security," adding:

This demands a broadening of the focus of security policy from its narrow orientation of managing state-to-state relationships, to one that recognises the importance of the individual and society for our shared security. . . There is consensus that such a broader orientation can best be achieved - at least cost, and to best effect - through approaches that broaden the response to security issues beyond military options and focus on promoting international cooperation, building stability and on preventing conflict.89
On the issue of security in the Arctic region, the statement said:

The focus in the Canadian Arctic is increasingly on non-traditional security threats. Canada's recent appointment of an Ambassador for Circumpolar Affairs will increase the focus on such threats. Our goal is to create an Arctic Council to meet the challenge of sustainable development in the North and to deal with the critical issues faced by all Arctic countries.90
The Arctic Council has now been created, but it cannot address the continuing traditional security concerns, which, while less important than before, must be confronted if the Arctic states are to be able to move on to broader security agendas. U.S. opposition to discussions of military security in the Arctic was a major factor in the American hesitation about participating in an Arctic Council; at American insistence the Council's founding declaration specifies that "The Arctic Council should not deal with issues of military security." This does not mean it cannot help advance regional security, however. As Oran Young told the Committee:

The United States, at least in its public position, is very explicit in saying that security issues should not be on the Arctic Council agenda. I wouldn't over-interpret that though. It's not easy to definitively separate issues. As you begin to talk about concrete, substantive issues, the security aspect of these issues often arises. I suspect there may be ways of drawing the United States into some discussions involving security questions without publicly saying that's what is happening. [40:13-14]
Given the broader interpretation of security increasingly being accepted by all governments, the Arctic Council can help address such "modern" security issues as military-related contamination of the region. By helping build confidence between the United States and Russia, the Council can also indirectly help prepare the way for any future bilateral or multilateral discussions of military security issues and thereby enhance the prospects for such discussions.

Canadian strategic analyst Peter Gizewski argued several years ago that:

It is time for the nations of the Arctic to adopt a circumpolar perspective on Arctic security. This is based on the belief that today there are common regional interests among the eight Arctic states and the people living in them, and that all circumpolar nations, not just the United States and Russia, have a responsibility for ensuring the peaceful development of the region. Crucial to this development is a recognition that the concept of security encompasses not only military, but social, economic and, indeed, environmental dimensions as well. With the end of the Cold War, the United States and Russia must once and for all adapt military activities to the new political realities. The Arctic must no longer play host to military activity based on the logic of a bygone era. Not only are the military threats too low, but the environmental risks may well be too high.91
Notwithstanding the uncertainties during the Cold War transitions and tensions over such issues as NATO enlargement, the fact that political relations among all eight Arctic states remain peaceful and reasonably stable provides the positive context for moving forward on cooperative security approaches. The Arctic states are now all members of the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE). As Kari Möttölä of the Finnish Foreign Ministry pointed out in a background paper prepared for the Second Conference of Parliamentarians of the Arctic Region, held in Yellowknife in 1996, this means they have already agreed to help develop "a common space of comprehensive, cooperative and indivisible security" on their territory. They have also agreed to continue to respect the non-use of force as a basic norm in international security; not to pursue their national security interests at the expense of other states; not to create spheres of influence or privileged or grey zones of security; and to adopt new cooperative security principles based on guidelines such as the sufficiency rule for defence capabilities, the democratic political control of armed forces, and the observance of international humanitarian law in the internal and external use of armed forces.92 More generally, in Mr. Möttölä's opinion, the states should focus on the promotion of stability, including the transition to democracy and a market economy in Russia; the development of measures and mechanisms for conflict management; and military-strategic stability through transparency, openness and arms control. In Helsinki, Möttölä's co-author, Lt. Colonel Arto Nokkola, of the Tampere Peace Research Institute, underlined to the Committee the need to address critical socio-economic concerns as well as the environmental situation in northern Russia, particularly in the Murmansk region of the Kola peninsula, as part of a circumpolar partnership for peace. The message more generally is that through such forms of multilateral cooperation each nation's security in the international Arctic can be advanced.

Reviewing Canada's Arctic "Sovereignty and Security" in a Circumpolar Context

Now that the multilateral environment has been transformed, Canada needs to rethink and adjust its own strategic policies in the Arctic. In the post-war period, successive Canadian governments viewed Arctic defence and security issues within the confined framework of the Cold War. Change was not easily accepted. Canada expressed "serious reservations" about President Gorbachev's 1987 Murmansk initiative, and the Canadian Government always rejected the idea of Arctic-specific arms control measures, arguing that the threat was global rather than regional. As David Cox told the Committee,

I think it is fair to say that throughout the Cold War Canada also saw the Arctic not as a region of concern but primarily as a set of activities - talking in security terms - which were a part of the east-west confrontation and therefore had to be dealt with in terms of the main negotiations east-west, those being the nuclear disarmament talks between the United States and the Soviet Union and the discussions between NATO and the Warsaw Pact. [21:7]
Sovereignty and security issues have traditionally been closely linked. In the Canadian Arctic, the United States has been, paradoxically, a close partner with Canada on defence issues but its only significant challenger on sovereignty issues. Through the NORAD and other agreements, Canada and the United States have cooperated in the defence of North America for almost four decades. Military construction during and after World War II brought many changes to the Canadian Arctic and raised the issue of Canadian sovereignty, which was emphasized in the Canadian Defence White Paper of 1971. In 1985, Canada and the United States agreed to upgrade radar coverage in the North through the construction of the North Warning System across northern Canada. The mid-1980s saw another wave of interest in sovereignty and security in the North, culminating in the 1987 defence White Paper Challenge and Commitment.

Following the transit of the American Coast Guard vessel Polar Sea through the Northwest Passage, in 1986 the Government declared "straight baselines" around the edges of Canada's Arctic archipelago and announced a mixture of military and civilian programs to increase both Canadian sovereignty and security in the Arctic. These included a polar class 8 icebreakers capable of year-round operation in Arctic waters; the purchase of some 12 nuclear-powered submarines capable of spending long periods under the Arctic ice; five Forward Operating Locations for fighter aircraft, and the establishment of a northern training centre for the Canadian Forces; and a Sub-surface Surveillance System to be installed at strategic choke points in the Arctic. In 1988, Canada and the United States entered into an Arctic Cooperation Agreement (the so-called "Icebreaker Agreement") under which future transits of U.S. icebreakers through the waters of the Arctic archipelago would be made with Canada's consent, although a non-prejudice clause also meant that neither state had changed its original position. The end of the Cold War and budget reductions resulted in the cancellation of such projects as the nuclear submarines and the polar class icebreaker, while others, such as the Forward Operating Locations, were reduced in number. On Canada's initiative, Canada and the United States also agreed in early 1994 to end the testing of U.S. cruise missiles in northern Canada.

Since the end of the Cold War, the Canadian Government has continued most of its sovereignty and defence policies in the Arctic, although they have received less attention in Canada's foreign policy than have cooperative regional issues such as the establishment of the Arctic Council. Ongoing Canadian Forces operations and capabilities in the Arctic are defensive and modest and include: the operation on behalf of Canada and the United States of the largely automated North Warning System at a reduced level of readiness; the Ranger program; sovereignty patrols flown by long-range patrol aircraft; land, air, signals, survival and other exercises carried out throughout the year; mapping and charting and scientific support operations; and the clean-up of former DEW line sites. The Canadian Forces have also improved their cooperation with the indigenous peoples of the North in at least one case, having signed an agreement with the Inuvialuit of the Western Arctic in 1996 to govern the use of Inuvialuit land for training by the Department of National Defence.

On the question of sovereignty, the Arctic Council cannot help to resolve long-standing disputes between members, such as those between Canada and the United States or between Norway and Russia; such disputes are likely to become less important over time, however, as regional cooperation replaces national sovereignty as a priority for Arctic States. Canada maintains its claims to sovereignty over the waters of the Arctic archipelago, but, once it has done its best to strengthen its claim, its concentration on the creation of a broader regime for the Arctic will probably benefit the residents of the region more than the narrow pursuit of sovereignty, though this may be helped thereby also. As Donald McRae of the University of Ottawa explained to the Committee, though the concerns that over the years led Canada to assert its sovereignty over the waters of the Arctic archipelago remain important, in an increasingly interdependent world the assertion of this sovereignty may not be the most useful means of securing Canada's goals. In his words,

I'm not suggesting that a sovereignty claim to the waters of the Arctic is obsolete or that it should be forgotten. What I am saying is that the idea of claiming sovereignty as a means of securing those objectives has more of a 19th-century than a 21st-century ring about it. The objectives that led Canada to pursue vigorously the claim to sovereignty in the Arctic may well be achievable rather through bilateral, regional, and multilateral mechanisms. . . Placing emphasis on collaborative activity with other states in the region and respective of Arctic waters rather than focussing on sovereignty does not seem to me to impair Canada's claim. It may even be interpreted as Canada acting as the sovereign in the region rather than being seen as perhaps defensively reacting every time some state does something that looks as if it is prejudicial to our claim. [21:5]
According to Donald McRae, following the decision to declare straight baselines and the negotiation of the 1988 icebreaker agreement, with one exception "there is little if anything more to be done to enhance Canada's claim to sovereignty over Arctic waters" [21:5]. The outstanding issue is the detection of U.S. submarine transits through the Arctic archipelago, since these take place without Canada's knowledge and may therefore weaken its claim to sovereignty.93 The Government has had difficulty in finding technology for an Arctic Sub-surface Surveillance System that is both affordable and effective in Arctic conditions. As a result (and, probably, because of the potential negative impact on Canada-U.S. relations), in a letter to a Member of Parliament in January 1996, former Defence Minister David Collenette said "there is at present no intention to deploy a system."94 The Canadian Arctic Resources Committee (CARC) and others have argued that a surveillance system remains necessary to strengthen Canadian claims of sovereignty over the waters of the Arctic archipelago. Terry Fenge, the Executive Director of CARC, raised the issue before the Committee. While such a system could only help Canada's sovereignty case, it is impossible to say by how much. According to David Cox, ". . . really the question is how much we are willing to pay to find out how few submarines transit the Northwest Passage" [21:6]. He added, "If I were making a guess, I would be very surprised if there are more than three transits a year of American submarines through the Northwest Passage. It would not surprise me if there are years in which there are no transits at all. So if you paid the $60 million for that sensor system, you have to ask yourselves how you would feel about the pay-off to it" [21:10]. According to Franklyn Griffiths:

For sovereignty, in a way there's an institutionalized need not to know what's going on up there. If we really knew, what would we do about it? I guess we would protest. The Chinese used to protest daily about the nationalist occupation of Quemoy and Matsu islands. These were daily protests in defence of Chinese sovereignty. I don't know if they added to a record; in fact they probably didn't. [15:36]
In light of the new agenda for international cooperation in the Arctic, the Committee agrees with the Government's decision to focus on such cooperation rather than legal confrontation. At the same time, Canada must be sure that its sovereignty claim to the waters of the Arctic archipelago is as strong as possible.

Accordingly:

Continuing Military-Strategic Concerns in the Arctic

Traditional military-strategic concerns in the Arctic continue to focus on the relationship between the U.S. and Russia, which are still the world's two largest nuclear powers and the dominant military powers in the region. More attention is paid to Russia, both because of its ongoing reforms and because, mainly for reasons of geography, it has the largest military forces permanently stationed in the Arctic. Mikhail Gorbachev's 1987 Murmansk speech called for an end to the Cold War and for increased "civilian security" in the Arctic, as well as for the creation of a demilitarized "zone of peace," though most Soviet forces would have been excluded from its area of application. While this speech did usher in a new era of cooperation on other issues, Western governments quickly dismissed its traditional security elements as self-serving. Russia's policies obviously changed dramatically with the end of the Cold War, but its military capabilities in the North did not diminish as quickly, and in fact increased temporarily as Russia moved conventional military equipment out of Europe as required by the 1990 Conventional Forces in Europe (CFE) Treaty. The CFE Treaty is now being re-negotiated by Canada and the other parties to take into account the new political and military realities in Europe, and it is hoped that this will resolve many of the residual concerns in the region (see Box 6 "The Balance of Conventional Military Forces in the Arctic Region").

Like the United States, Russia continues to see its nuclear deterrent force as the bottom line guarantee of its security, and, some have argued, as its last claim to superpower status. In fact, a large and growing percentage of this force is based in the Arctic. The two states have already made significant cuts in their strategic nuclear arsenals since the end of the Cold War, down from the 10,000-12,000 warheads each deployed in the late 1980s to 6,000-7,000 each under the START I Treaty. The Russian parliament has yet, however, to ratify the follow-on START II agreement, which would further reduce the arsenals to 3,500-3,000 for each side. The Committee met with both the Chairman of the State Duma Committee on Foreign Affairs, Vladimir Lukin, and the head of its subcommittee on legal issues while in Moscow. They told us that the START II treaty is seen by Duma members as flawed, since its reductions are unbalanced, put a disproportionate onus on Russia, and cost more than that country can afford to implement. The ratification of START II has also been increasingly linked to such broader security issues as NATO enlargement and U.S. proposals for national and theatre missile defence systems. The March 1997 Helsinki Summit between Presidents Clinton and Yeltsin saw welcome progress in the area of strategic arms reductions; in return for U.S. agreement to extend the deadline for its implementation from 2003 to 2007, President Yeltsin pledged to recommend ratification of START II to the Duma. This would be followed immediately by negotiations for a follow-on START III agreement that would further reduce strategic arsenals to 2,000-2,500 deployed warheads each by 2007. Some progress was also made in Helsinki on the question of missile defences, including a reaffirmation by both parties of the importance of the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty. They agreed to work, both together and with others, on a high-level political document that would establish cooperation between NATO and Russia as an important element of a new comprehensive European security system; however, the two presidents continued to disagree on the issue of NATO enlargement.

As the Committee heard during its trip to Russia, feelings on the subject of NATO enlargement run high. Deputy Foreign Minister Georgiy Mamedov told the Committee in Moscow that Russia is not fixated on NATO, but the issue keeps being provoked from the other side. Arguments for NATO enlargement imply that Russia is still a threat in the region, which makes that country feel unfairly targeted, since it is "not an amputated U.S.S.R. but a new country (and democracy) too." Russia is interested in cooperation with NATO but, given the history of that organization, does not believe that an effective European security system can be built around it and would prefer a more inclusive model such as the OSCE. Vladimir Lukin agreed that Duma members are "firmly against" any NATO enlargement that would isolate Russia and imply it is a threat to its neighbours. On the day the Committee was scheduled to be in Murmansk, Russian Foreign Minister Primakov told the ministerial conference of the Council of the Barents Euro-Arctic Region, chaired by Russia:

Box 6 - ``The Balance of Conventional Military Forces in the Arctic Region''(1)





Source: Kari Möttöllä and Arto Nokkola, Political and Military Aspects of Security in the Arctic, prepared for the Second Conference of Parliamentarians of the Arctic Region, Yellowknife, NWT, 13-14 March 1996.

References: The Military Balance 1995-1996; The Military Balance in Northern Europe 1994-1995.

Lately an alarming aspect has appeared in the positions of certain states: emphasis is made not on the formation of an all-European system, but on an arrangement between Russia and NATO, which those states try to present as an alternative to such an architecture. Moreover, we witness attempts to make NATO the main axis of the European security system. We do not share this point of view. We are convinced that the central role in providing European security and stability must belong to the OSCE which should be acting in coordination with other organizations, including EU, WEU and NATO.95
Serious reservations on the question of NATO's enlargement also surfaced during the Committee's meetings in Finland. While the Committee will continue to monitor this issue separately from that of circumpolar cooperation, it should be noted that the goal of enlargement is to increase the security of all states and this cannot be accomplished by isolating Russia, or by allowing it to see enlargement of the Alliance as a threat to its security. Despite the relative success of the Helsinki Summit-including its emphasis on the role of the OSCE-the tension between Russia and the West which has developed over years is unlikely to disappear overnight. Continued cooperation across a range of issues in the Arctic and elsewhere can only help increase overall confidence and trust, and Canadians should therefore use these Arctic cooperation channels to help bridge differences and build understanding with our Russian counterparts.

One unchanging aspect of the military situation in the Arctic is Russia's deployment of significant nuclear submarine forces in the region. Given that country's lack of other secure ice-free ports for its submarines, the Kola peninsula will undoubtedly remain the home base for most of its powerful ballistic missile submarines and the forces protecting them until well into the future. Russia's smaller ballistic missile submarine force is already more important than it was in 1990, and, in the opinion of the U.S. Office of Naval Intelligence, this importance will continue to grow whether or not the START II agreement is ratified and implemented.96 In recent years, the Russian Navy has struggled to keep its smaller submarine forces effective, increasing "blue water" operations and exercises, such as the firing in August 1995 of a ballistic missile from under the polar ice within 500 kilometres of Canada's land mass. In November 1996, on the eve of the Committee's visit to Russia, for the first time in a decade Russia launched construction of a new class of ballistic missile submarines.97 (The U.S. Office of Naval Intelligence estimates that this submarine will not reach initial operational capability until 2005, and Russian authorities are still not sure whether it will be based in the Northern or Pacific Fleets). While this initiative is at least partly related to Russia's desire to preserve the most advanced segment of its shipbuilding industry, Leonid Petrov, Chairman of the Ecology Committee, pointed to the submarine development in a meeting with Committee members in St. Petersburg as an example of how NATO enlargement must be weighed carefully since it could be used to justify new Russian defence spending compounding further the environmental risks.98

On the military level, two schools of thought have emerged with respect to Arctic security. The more traditional of these welcomes the reduction of tensions in the region following the end of the Cold War, and argues that further actions are unnecessary. The other argues that, because of U.S. and Russian resistance, the Arctic region has yet to catch up with Europe and elsewhere in terms of arms control and confidence-building, and urges that such measures be negotiated in this respect to lock in the benefits of the post-Cold War world. As David Cox told the Committee:

In the past five years or so in the Arctic tensions have been very low in the post-Cold War period. By and large, all of the governments involved and most of the individuals who look at these issues have drawn the conclusion that it's therefore not necessary to discuss security issues. In fact, one should have drawn the opposite conclusion and said that when tensions are low, that's the time to put in place institutions and procedures that guard against the difficulties when tensions rise. [21:24]
Canadian and other experts have argued for years that a number of possibilities exist for regional arms control and confidence- and security-building measures (CSBMs), which would enhance the stability of the Arctic as a theatre of military operations, minimize the impact of any such operations on the region and its peoples, and help keep the overall strategic balance. As Oran Young points out, these possibilities include explicit agreements or, perhaps more likely, tacit understandings. In his opinion, "interesting" possibilities for first measures include: codes of conduct governing the operations of nuclear-powered attack submarines, the elimination of forward operating bases for military aircraft in the high Arctic, advance notification of military manoeuvres, the organization of joint military exercises in the region, and the dedication of additional submarine cruises to scientific research in the central Arctic Ocean.99

Some of these initiatives have already begun. Since 1994 Canada, Russia and the United States have carried out several small joint search and rescue training exercises in the Arctic. As George Newton, Chairman of the U.S. Arctic Research Commission, told the Committee, "One of the most significant recent achievements in cooperative Arctic research has been a submarine Arctic science program. In this program, now in its second of five years, the U.S. Navy has agreed to provide annually a nuclear submarine to operate in the central Arctic Ocean, with the sole mission of providing support for the civilian science community" [62:4]. On the question of nuclear attack submarines, these are "the most dangerous vessels to global environmental safety," in the opinion of the Washington-based Center for Technology Assessment, and the most provocative, given their practice of "cat and mouse" surveillance operations.100 After a number of collisions between U.S. and Russian nuclear submarines in the Arctic had resulted in a U.S. presidential apology at the Vancouver summit in 1993, Secretary of Defense Les Aspin announced that there had been a "dramatic" change in the U.S. Navy's submarine operations to avoid recurrence of the problem; however, Russia was still accusing U.S. submarines of violating its waters a year later.

The principle of reducing military forces in the Arctic as much as possible is difficult to argue against, yet the U.S. reluctance suggests that such a prospect is unrealistic at the moment. This does not mean, however, that Canada and the other Arctic states cannot take useful steps to increase regional security in the meantime. As David Cox told the Committee, "In my view, what we should do as our long-term objective is to state that our ultimate goal is to demilitarize the Arctic. For example, in regard to the most lethal pollutants of all, nuclear materials, the circumpolar states could set as their long-term goal a nuclear regime to regulate all aspects of nuclear activity." Given that the United States and Russia have always opposed the idea of a Nuclear Weapon Free Zone in the Arctic, Professor Cox and others have recommended a "zone within a zone" approach, focussing first on the establishment of an "Arctic Zone of Peace and Cooperation." Once such a zone was established, Canada and the Nordic states could declare a smaller Nuclear Weapon Free Zone on their territory, which the U.S. and Russia could join as their comfort level increased.101 Professor Cox told the Committee that "the challenge is to think of a process, and I emphasize process, that would take us step by step towards that notion of demilitarizing the Arctic while not ignoring these very serious issues, which pose specific problems for the United States and Russia" [21:9]. In his opinion, this could best be done through a long-term process beginning with so-called "track two" or nongovernmental diplomacy:

Without making any excessive, grandiose claims for a demilitarized zone, my suggestion would be that this Committee might look very carefully at the creation and encouragement of a parallel discussion - which could be and perhaps ought to be, in the first instance, a nongovernmental discussion group - to consider specific steps towards it. I'm not suggesting that this should be pushed onto the agenda of the Arctic Council, because it would be the surest way to raise the objections of the United States. To create a parallel group could simply be a recommendation. Then it would look very much like some other proposals that have taken five to ten years to come to fruition. [21:19]
The strategic importance of the Arctic during the Cold War prevented it from being formally demilitarized like the Antarctic. Yet the Committee is convinced that the residents and states of the Arctic would benefit from the ultimate elimination of military forces in the region. Given current realities, Canada's most useful contribution is probably to declare its support for the principle and facilitate its further study outside the Arctic Council process.

Accordingly:

Towards Cooperation on Arctic "Environmental Security"

As discussed earlier and noted in Chapter Three, the Arctic Council cannot deal directly with questions of military security or, indeed, national sovereignty. It can, however, address other security issues. Oran Young put it to the Committee this way:

If one were to raise the question of security in the sense of military aircraft deployed over the Arctic, the United States would be very resistant, but my hope is that by reframing the security agenda and talking, as you suggested, about these larger questions, that may be a way to allow the security questions to be raised in the Arctic Council setting in a manner that isn't rejected or opposed, for example, by the United States. [40:17]
The term "environmental security" embraces both the environmental factors behind potentially violent conflicts and the impact of global environmental degradation on the well-being of societies and economies. A key point is that, since it addresses common problems, environmental security demands cooperative rather than confrontational responses. Unfortunately, since many of these problems are by nature long-term and political, systems focussed on short-term results may be inadequate for addressing them.102 As has been argued by Jan Syse, a Norwegian parliamentarian whom the Committee met in Oslo, this is why a broader set of coordinated multilateral policy instruments and institutions is needed in working towards a collective environmental security regime for the Arctic.103

The environmental effects of military activity in the Arctic were put on the regional security agenda in early 1992, when Norway proposed that NATO's Committee on the Challenges of Modern Society (CCMS) should, in cooperation with the new North Atlantic Cooperation Council, study the issue of "Cross-Border Environmental Problems Emanating from Defence-Related Installations and Activities." Some 23 countries participated in the study, which focussed on radionuclide and chemical contamination, and the completed Phase One report was published by NATO in April 1995. Within the United States, environmental issues have taken on a higher profile in the past two years, and in April 1996 then Secretary of State Warren Christopher signalled a new priority for such issues in U.S. foreign policy in a major speech at Stanford University. The U.S. military does not spend large sums of money on environmental security, but it is an important element of the concept of "preventive defense" introduced by former Defense Secretary William Perry. As the U.S. Deputy Undersecretary of Defense (Environmental Security) explained, "our security depends on more than being able to prevent missile attacks. Our security depends equally as much on preventing the conditions that lead to conflict and on helping to create the conditions for peace."104 Commenting on the Arctic, Perry said in late 1996: "I have been to the Arctic twice this year. I will never forget the pristine landscape, the crystal waters and the fresh air. Anybody who has seen the Arctic knows why we must preserve this raw and fragile environment. Geographically, the Arctic is the closest route between the United States and Russia, so it is fitting that in preserving this route, we bring our nations closer together."105

While not as heavily militarized as some other regions throughout the Cold War, parts of the Arctic have seen significant military activity over the years, which has resulted in damage to the environment; a 1995 Finnish study identified as examples of this: Soviet nuclear testing at the twin islands of Novaya Zemlya and the dumping of nuclear waste and reactors in the Barents and Kara Seas; NATO low-level flying in Labrador; and a nuclear accident near the American airbase at Thule, Greenland in 1968.106

NATO's CCMS Study considered a number of sources of chemical contamination in the region, including chemical munitions dumped at sea and contamination of land-based sites by chemical warfare agents, explosives and other pollutants, such as fuel and lubricants. In addition, the "normal" use of fuel and other lubricants has resulted in significant contamination over the years. The study concluded that the dumping of chemical munitions at sea does not currently pose an acute threat to either human beings or the environment. In the case of land-based sites, it recommended that redemption be accelerated and that more effort be put into research and development of new, alternative techniques such as biological redemption. Finally, the Committee recommended international standardization of soil quality parameters and threshold values for civilian and military uses of land areas, as well as better training to help military personnel understand chemical pollution and how to prevent it.107

Since Russia has the largest military forces in the region, its North, including the Kola peninsula with its nuclear waste problems, is the most severely contaminated. Meeting with the Committee in Moscow, Russia's Minister of Atomic Energy, Viktor Mikhailov, told the Committee that, while nuclear contamination in the Murmansk region was important, contamination by heavy metals and chemicals was the most serious imminent environmental and health danger. Nor has the territory of other states been immune to the effects of the military. In Canada, for example, a number of current and former military sites, including some 42 that were originally part of the Distant Early Warning (DEW) radar line, require varying degrees of clean-up, mostly because of hydrocarbon-contaminated soil. The Committee had planned to discuss this issue among others during a scheduled visit to Cambridge Bay in the Canadian Arctic, but bad weather prevented the visit. However, we note the work done by the House of Commons Standing Committee on Environment and Sustainable Development, which did visit dumpsites in Cambridge Bay and Iqaluit in the preparation of its 1995 report It's About Our Health!: Towards Pollution Prevention.

Responsibility for the clean-up of these sites in northern Canada is divided between two government departments, the Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development (DIAND), and the Department of National Defence (DND). DIAND is responsible for cleaning up former military sites, including 21 of the DEW line sites which were turned over to it in the 1960s and a number of others. DND is responsible for cleaning up current military sites, including the 21 DEW line sites not turned over to DIAND. In formulating their clean-up priorities and plans, both departments first consider the risk posed by the various sites to human health and safety and then treaty and other legal obligations. DND began the clean-up of its 21 DEW line sites in 1996, and plans to finish the rest over 10 years at a cost of some $242 million, with cost-sharing being negotiated with the United States. DIAND has already cleaned up several sites, and it, too, plans to complete the rest over ten years.

During the NATO study, Canada emphasized the need to involve local communities in the initial phase of clean-up planning. As a result of its mandate, DIAND (and, to a lesser extent, DND) has involved local communities in the site clean-ups, providing employment to local residents and teaching them skills that they may go on to employ elsewhere. An example was the 1994 clean-up of DIAND's first DEW line site, at Horton River in the Northwest Territories. This operation created jobs for over 40 local residents, and involved removal from the site of more than 800 barrels of oil, diesel fuel, gasoline and grease, a gravel conveyor, a warehouse, the contents of two 20,000-gallon fuel tanks, and PCB-contaminated soil. Given funding constraints, priorities must always be established, and Canada is fortunate that the low population density in its Arctic means that sites that pose little threat to communities can simply be contained while others are dealt with first; however, other states may not have this option.

The most significant and welcome recognition of the link between military forces and the environment in the Arctic came in September 1996, when, on Norway's initiative, the United States, Russia and Norway entered into the Arctic Military Environmental Cooperation (AMEC) agreement to ensure that their military activities do not harm the Arctic environment. AMEC will initially focus on six projects, four that are nuclear-related and two that are not. The projects will range in duration from 6 to 36 months, and initial results are expected within a year. During the Committee's trip to Norway, Norwegian officials told members that AMEC was a "landmark" agreement from both environmental and broader political points of view, since it has engaged the two nuclear superpowers in environmental clean-up work. The intention is to keep AMEC trilateral, but provision was made in the agreement for the participation of other states in specific projects as appropriate. Such participation would not necessarily be expensive, since the need would likely be for scientific and technical expertise.

The participation of other states in AMEC would emphasize the multilateral nature of the military-environmental threats in the Arctic, as would a conference on environmental security cooperation like those already held in other regions.

In light of that:

For many, the most important - and symbolic - environmental security issue in the Arctic, in terms of the threat to human health and the environment, is radioactive pollution, perhaps the ultimate legacy of the Cold War.108 During its trips to Scandinavia and Russia, the Committee was convinced of the importance of nuclear issues in the region, including the safety of civilian power reactors, nuclear waste management and nuclear proliferation. In Moscow, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Georgiy Mamedov told the Committee that progress on nuclear safety issues "is a matter of survival." While international action in this area has been very slow, the past year has seen some welcome progress as well as evidence that the danger is finally being appreciated and is starting to be addressed at all levels.

Radionuclides in the Arctic derive from a number of sources, including fallout from atmospheric nuclear testing in the 1950s and 1960s, European nuclear power stations, and the 1986 Chernobyl accident. These sources have all declined over the years and, with Russia and the other declared nuclear powers having signed a Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty in 1996, nuclear testing will not cause further contamination in the Arctic. Attention is now focussed on northern Russia, where local radionuclide concentrations also derive from some 130 nuclear tests carried out at the twin Arctic islands of Novaya Zemlya between 1955 and 1990; the pre-1992 regular dumping by the Navy of low and medium-level liquid (and, less frequently, solid) radioactive waste at sea; a number of accidents involving nuclear submarines; and, potentially the most serious for the future, the continuing problems associated with Russia's aging nuclear submarine fleet.

As speculation and international concern mounted, in 1993 the Russian government published the so-called "White Book" or Yablokov report, which provided solid background information on Russian nuclear dumping and tests and accidents during the Cold War. Russia has voluntarily observed the international ban on the dumping of radioactive waste at sea since 1993 and, although it has yet to ratify the necessary amendment to the 1972 London Convention, it has promised to abide by it, most recently at the April 1996 Moscow Nuclear Safety Summit attended by Prime Minister Chrétien. Fortunately, experts feel that international action need not focus on radioactive materials already dumped in the Arctic marine environment. International expeditions have visited key sites of radioactive dumping and accidents, such as the site of the sinking of the Komsomolets nuclear-powered and armed submarine in the Norwegian Sea in 1989, and have generally concluded that the risk of further radionuclide leakage is minor. The International Atomic Energy Agency has been studying associated long-term risks, and a report is expected in 1997. Attention is now focussing on onshore activities which could result in further (and worse) radioactive contamination.

The most high-profile nuclear issue in the Arctic, and the one most directly linked to military operations, is Russia's inability to safely deal with the nuclear fuel and waste produced by the simultaneous operation and reduction of its nuclear submarine fleet. These both rely on the same infrastructure of service ships, on-shore storage facilities, secure transport containers and rail and other links, all of which are totally inadequate in the Russian North. During the Cold War, Russia built the world's largest fleet of nuclear-powered submarines, most of which were based in the Northern Fleet, which has been operating vessels with nuclear propulsion since 1960.109 The normal operation of nuclear submarines requires the regular removal and replacement of spent nuclear fuel (generally every seven years in the case of Russian submarines, or twice in the lifetime of the vessel). In Russia, however, the necessary infrastructure for removing, storing and transporting spent nuclear fuel and other by-products was traditionally given low priority and so even years ago was inadequate, poorly maintained and near capacity. In recent years, the combination of mass obsolescence, severe military budget cuts and treaty-mandated reductions of nuclear missile firing submarines has compounded this problem, and has left Russia (and particularly the Russian Navy, which has basically been left to deal with the problem alone) with a very serious situation in both its Northern and Pacific Fleets. The United States and Japan are helping Russia address these issues in the Pacific, and the United States and Norway have so far taken the lead in the North.

The process of decommissioning submarines is time-consuming and expensive. Unable to handle the spent nuclear fuel and other waste, the Russian Navy often resorted to what amounted to floating storage, whereby many of these older submarines were kept floating at dockside with this material intact on board. Some submarines have been in this situation for 15 years. As early as 1991, the Director of U.S. Naval Intelligence pointed out that "the scrapping of old nuclear submarines (in 1990) was being slowed not by a requirement to keep the boats in the order-of-battle, but by the unavailability of enough scrapping facilities to accommodate them and the absence of a program to dispose of the reactors and nuclear material." The situation has not improved over the last six years, and in fact has become worse as on-shore storage facilities have become even more filled up.

According to material submitted to the Committee by Bellona, "The greatest risk to safety is presented by the 52 submarines which have not yet been defuelled. The submarines are not brought into dock, and are in very poor condition. The vessels still containing their nuclear fuel are undermanned. If the work of decommissioning these submarines is to proceed in a proper way, a significant infusion of funds either from the state or from some other source will be necessary." 110 In September 1995, a "nuclear catastrophe" nearly occurred when the Kola peninsula power authority turned off the electricity to a nuclear submarine base because of unpaid bills. The cooling system on one of the four decommissioned submarines at the base failed without outside power, and its reactors began to overheat; power was finally restored by armed soldiers sent to the power authority by the local military commander.

Apart from the environmental risks, this issue has also been highlighted by the actions of the Russian government. After cooperating for several years with environmental activists who were monitoring the nuclear waste storage and other problems in northern Russia, Russia's attitude changed. In February 1996, Russian authorities arrested Alexander Nikitin, a former Soviet naval officer and employee of Bellona, and accused him of divulging state secrets during his work on the exhaustive Bellona report The Russian Northern Fleet. Bellona denied the accusations, and the case caused an international outcry. Amnesty International declared Mr. Nikitin a prisoner of conscience, and the Committee was among many who communicated with the Russian government to urge a free and fair trial for him. In addition to military secrecy, observers speculated that the Russian government was positioning itself as more hard-line in the runup to the presidential election in 1996, after becoming tired of continual criticism without much real assistance. In December 1996, Mr. Nikitin was released after ten months in jail, although the charges against him were not dropped.

Critics fear environmental catastrophe from a number of sources, including the sinking of partly decommissioned submarines moored near shore with intact nuclear reactors or spent fuel aboard, the leakage of such material from inadequate and poorly maintained land-based storage facilities, or the resumption by the Russian Navy of the dumping of nuclear reactors or waste at sea. Poor security at on-shore waste storage sites could also lead to theft of such material, and it has also been suggested that the nuclear material from the Komsomolets and three other Russian submarines that sank during the Cold War could be a proliferation hazard.

In one of its last reports, in September 1995, the U.S. Congress's Office of Technology Assessment estimated that at Russia's current capacity for dismantling submarines, its decommissioning program will take at least another 20 years, and emphasized the need for "care, caution, awareness and prudence."111 NATO's CCMS Study modelled the impact of two sorts of hypothetical accidents related to decommissioned Russian submarines moored near the Kola peninsula. It concluded that, though accidents involving large releases of radioactivity would clearly have significant local consequences, their cross-border, international impacts would be modest. At the same time, it was concluded that the present rate of submarine decommissioning, and the Northern Fleet's limited capacity for defuelling, storing and transporting nuclear waste, indicated a problem of "considerable magnitude" in northwest Russia. The Committee accepts that the danger to the waters of the European Arctic is more serious than that to Canadian waters, but feels strongly that all states - and particularly all Arctic states - must move quickly to address these issues or face a much more expensive and damaging crisis in the future.

The first elements of this cooperation are now in place. Assisting Russia in dismantling its excess nuclear submarines is in the interest of all the states of the region, since it will reduce the military threat, protect the environment and provide jobs for Russian workers. The U.S. Navy, which has considerable expertise in decommissioning nuclear vessels, is helping Russia to dismantle its submarines as required by the START I treaty. In October 1996, U.S. Secretary of Defense Perry visited the Little Star shipyard outside Archangel to observe the dismantling of a Russian nuclear submarine. As he put it:

A few years ago that submarine was out on patrol, carrying enough nuclear missiles to destroy dozens of American cities. Now it is being dismantled by some of the same Russian workers who built it, using equipment provided by the United States Department of Defense. The waters all around the Little Star shipyard are packed with old Russian nuclear submarines. These submarines no longer threaten the world with a nuclear holocaust. However, they are still a major environmental hazard to the Arctic region. By helping Russia dismantle these subs we are creating a win-win-win situation.112
While everyone recognizes the dangers to the environment and health posed by these submarines, some feel Alexi Yablokov's September 1995 comment (that they are "floating Chernobyls") is an exaggeration, pointing out that the nuclear reactors on board submarines are typically much smaller than civilian nuclear power reactors, that the Russian experts who built the submarines are aware of the dangers, and that the reactors are in any case enclosed. A former nuclear submariner, Chairman of the U.S. Arctic Research Commission George Newton, told the Committee:

The Murmansk situation is indeed very severe; however, much of the radioactive material is contained within reactor vessels and they are within submarine hulls. Maybe they are not built to the integrity of submarine hulls that we in the United States or you in Canada would traditionally like to see after a certain lifetime; nonetheless there is some form of containment for that radioactive material. . . As a nuclear submariner I feel confident, through my association with the nuclear reactor program, to think the reactors that have been dumped on the ocean bottom - albeit it's absolutely abhorrent - are probably not the contamination problem we should be worrying about, because the land-based contamination is the true unknown. [62:5-6]
Norwegian officials agreed, telling the Committee in Oslo that, while the Norwegian government was helping Russia deal with the submarines, they were less concerned with the submarines themselves than with such issues as storage and treatment of nuclear waste which could leak into the surrounding ground or water or be stolen. International cooperation has already begun; Russian and Western experts sealed a crack in the bow of the sunken submarine Komsomolets in the summer of 1995 in what Bellona described as ". . . an important pilot project that will prove invaluable in developing cooperation between Western and Russian authorities."113 Another important pilot project involved the cooperation of Russian and Western companies to remove spent and damaged nuclear fuel from the Russian storage ship Lepse in Murmansk; the technology proposed for this project could also be used to handle spent nuclear fuel in other locations.

In view of Norway's proximity to the Kola peninsula, the Norwegian government has taken a lead in addressing regional nuclear issues at all levels, and sees itself playing a "catalytic" role in the international arena by raising awareness and encouraging action on these issues. The Norwegian government has adopted a multi-year Plan of Action with four priority areas: safety measures at nuclear facilities; management, storage and disposal of spent nuclear fuel and radioactive waste; the dumping of radioactive waste in the Barents and Kara Seas and inputs into the sea via Russian rivers; and arms-related environmental hazards. The Barents Euro-Arctic Region process has also begun to address nuclear issues.114 At the November 1996 conference referred to earlier, Russian Foreign Minister Primakov, as outgoing Chair, noted the progress made on the nuclear issues in the past year, adding that:

These measures will to certain extent lower the risk of radioactive contamination in the region. But the scale and complexity of current tasks make it necessary for other member countries and observers of the CBER to join the process of their implementation. The Russian side will provide considerable financial resources for the purposes of radiation safety.115
Norwegian authorities told the Committee that there is no reliable estimate of the cost of a clean-up of the region, since this would depend on the definition of "clean-up." In Moscow, Russia's Atomic Energy Minister, Viktor Mikhailov, who is familiar with both nuclear issues and the region, having spent 20 years as a senior physicist at the Novaya Zemlya weapons development complex, tried to reassure the Committee that the cost of a nuclear clean-up would be "not very huge" - perhaps $16-17 million (U.S.) for the construction of interim storage facilities, and $40-50 million to transport the radioactive material out of the region. As an indication of the budgetary problems, however, his Ministry had received only $2 million of the $16 million allotted for this purpose in 1996. Whatever the exact amount needed, the Committee agrees with Norwegian Foreign Minister Bjørn Tore Godal, who told the Storting in October 1996 that, "the main responsibility for dealing with the problem lies with the Russians themselves, but the problems are so enormous that they cannot be solved by Russia alone."116






For years the United States has (slowly) assisted Russia in the dismantling of submarine and other strategic nuclear weapons under its Cooperative Threat Reduction (or Nunn-Lugar) program. The creation of the AMEC program broadens the military/environmental cooperation in the region beyond a bilateral focus on nuclear weapons. The Committee agrees with the suggestions for action that Bellona made to the Committee in Norway for establishing priorities with the Russians and concentrating on interim measures that will improve the situation until Russia is in a better position, economically and otherwise, to address it.

Canada has cooperated with Russia on nuclear issues for several years, focussing mainly on improving the safety of Russian civilian nuclear reactors. It has also done considerable work on the proposal to burn surplus plutonium from the Russian nuclear weapons program in Canadian-based CANDU reactors, although the Committee has heard differing opinions on the merits of this proposal. Current Canadian work to improve nuclear safety in northern Russia must continue but, given the importance and symbolism of the military-related nuclear problems with respect to the Arctic region, it should also be broadened.

Accordingly:

Security of Arctic Peoples and Environment

With the appointment of a Circumpolar Ambassador and the creation of an Arctic Council, Canada has achieved a number of the goals that analysts and the Government's own 1995 Foreign Policy Statement felt could help increase security in the region. Further work must be done to meet modern security challenges in the region, but this can be accomplished only in cooperation with residents of the North. By ensuring that the interdependent nature of modern security is better understood and that mechanisms for regional cooperation, such as the Arctic Council, function properly in the meantime, however, Canada and the other Arctic states can strengthen the broader foundation for future security measures.

The end of the Cold War has seen a welcome inversion of security concerns, so that the security of individuals and the environment in the Arctic is now placed above the traditional state sovereignty and defence issues that dominated throughout the Cold War. Yet as one analyst cautions: "The transition from the old geopolitics to the new geopolitics in the Arctic may not be as smooth as one would wish."117 Canada and the other Arctic states must deal with the legacy of the Cold War in the region before they can focus totally on the new agenda, which will include the process to establish confidence-building and other measures. But it is clear that the needs of Arctic residents in the future will focus less on the protection of states and sovereignty than on the protection of environment and culture. As the Committee was told in Stockholm by Richard Langlais, the Canadian author of Reformulating Security: A Case Study From Arctic Canada, "negative security" looks at threats, but "positive security" looks at needs. At their March 1996 meeting in Yellowknife, parliamentarians from the Arctic states recommended:

The adoption of national policies and international arrangements that broaden Arctic security issues from a predominantly military focus to the development of collective environmental security that includes the values, life styles, and cultural identity of indigenous northern societies. . .118
This new agenda for security cooperation is inextricably linked to the aims of environmentally sustainable human development. Meeting these challenges is essential to the long-term foundation for assuring circumpolar security, with priority being given to the well-being of Arctic peoples and to safeguarding northern habitats from intrusions which have impinged aggressively on them. The legacy of the past, as reviewed above, cannot be ignored. But the goal must be to move forward on the future agenda to which we now turn.

85
Canadian Arctic Resources Committee, editorial essay on the 1994 parliamentary foreign policy and defence reviews, Northern Perspectives, Vol. 22, No. 4, Winter 1994-95, p. 1.

86
Sanjay Chaturvedi, "The Post-Cold War Arctic: International Cooperation and Dispute Management," in The Polar Regions (1996), p. 173.

87
Franklyn Griffiths, "Defence, Security and Civility in the Arctic Region," in Arctic Challenges: Report from the Nordic Council's Arctic Parliamentary Conference in Reykjavik, August 1993, p. 135-136.

88
Canada's Foreign Policy: Principles and Priorities for the Future, November 1994, p. 11.

89
Canada and the World, Ottawa, February 1995, p. 25.

90
Ibid., p. 29.

91
"Military Activity and Environmental Security: The Case of Radioactivity in the Arctic," in Joan Debardeleben and John Hannigan, eds., Environmental Security in a Post-Communist World, Westview Press, Boulder, Colo., 1994, p. 37.

92
Kari Möttölä and Arto Nokkola, Political and Military Aspects of Security in the Arctic, paper prepared for the Second Conference of Parliamentarians of the Arctic Region, Yellowknife, March 1996.

93
As Donald McRae had concluded in an earlier review of the legal issues: "A precondition for exercising enforcement jurisdiction-for taking measures against unauthorized sub-surface traffic-is knowledge of occurrence. To exercise the sovereign authority it claims and to preserve its claim to sovereignty over Arctic waters, Canada must at least be in a position to monitor sub-surface use of the waters of the Arctic Archipelago." ("Arctic Sovereignty: Loss by Dereliction?", Northern Perspective, Winter 1994-95, p. 9.)

94
Paul Koring, "Collenette Drops Plan to Monitor Arctic," The Globe and Mail (Toronto), 3 February 1996, A.3.

95
Statement by the Chairman of the Council of the Barents Euro-Arctic Region, Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation E. Primakov, Fourth Session, Petrozavodsk, 6 November 1996, p. 5-6.

96
U.S. Office of Naval Intelligence, Worldwide Submarine Challenges, Washington, February 1996, p. 22.

97
"Nuclear Sub Launched," The Moscow Times, 5 November 1996, p. 4. The start of construction was described as marking "a new stage in the development of Russia's nuclear strength and its drive to maintain the status of a nuclear power." The 2 November launching ceremony at the Arctic port of Severodvinsk was presided over by President Yeltsin's chief of staff Anatoly Chubais, since appointed first deputy prime minister in the revamped Cabinet of March 1997, and considered by many to be the real power in government.

98
On the extent of these risks in the Arctic region around Murmansk see Fred Barbash, "Nuclear Specter Rises from Naval Graveyard," The Washington Post, 11 October 1996.

99
Oran Young, The Arctic Council: Marking a New Era in International Relations (1996), p. 37-38.

100
The Threat of Nuclear Submarine Operations to Global Security and Environmental Safety: A Preliminary Report, International Center for Technology Assessment, Washington D.C., 1996, p. 4.

101
David Cox, "Reflections on International Peace and Security in the Circumpolar Arctic," in Lamb ed., A Northern Foreign Policy for Canada, John B. Lamb, ed., Ottawa, The Canadian Polar Commission and the Canadian Centre for Global Security, October (1994).

102
Gareth Porter, "Environmental Security as a National Security Issue," Current History, May 1995, p. 218-222.

103
Jan Syse, "Collective Environmental Security," Presentation to the Second Conference of Parliamentarians of the Arctic Region, Yellowknife, March 1996.

104
Sherri Goodman, The Environment and National Security, National Defense University, 8 August 1996.

105
Remarks by Secretary of Defense Perry at the Society of American Engineers Luncheon Re: Environmental Security Policy, Arlington, Virginia, 20 November 1996.

106
Lassi Heininen, Olli-Pekka Jalonen and Jyrki Käkönen, Expanding The Northern Dimension, Tampere Peace Research Institute Research Report No. 61, 1995, p. 87-93.

107
NATO/CCMS/NACC Pilot Study: Cross-Border Environmental Problems Emanating from Defence-Related Installations and Activities, Summary Final Report Phase 1 1993-1995, North Atlantic Treaty Organization, Report No. 206, April 1995.

108
Peter Gizewski, "Military Activity and Environmental Security: The Case of Radioactivity in the Arctic," in Debardeleben and Hannigan (1994).

109
Oleg Bukharin and Joshua Handler, "Russian Nuclear-Powered Submarine Decommissioning," Science and Global Security, Vol. 5, 1995, p. 245-271.

110
The Bellona Foundation, "Radioactive Waste and Spent Nuclear Fuel at the Kola Peninsula," material provided to the House of Commons Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs and International Trade, November 1996.

111
Office of Technology Assessment , U.S. Congress. Nuclear Wastes in the Arctic: An Analysis of Arctic and Other Regional Impacts from Soviet Nuclear Contamination, OTA-ENV-623, Washington D.C., U.S. Government Printing Office, September 1995, p. iii.

112
Remarks by Secretary of Defense Perry at the Society of American Engineers Luncheon Re: Environmental Security Policy, Arlington, Virginia, 20 November 1996.

113
The Russian Northern Fleet, Bellona Factsheet No. 6, 14 November 1996 (retrieved through Internet).

114
Erlends Calabuig Odins, "Après-guerre froide en Europe arctique," Le monde diplomatique, September 1996.

115
Statement by the Chairman of the Council of the Barents Euro-Arctic Region, p. 4.

116
"Nuclear Safety Issues," Statement to the Norwegian Storting by Foreign Minister Bjørn Tore Godal,29 October 1996.

117
Sanjay Chaturvedi, "The Post-Cold War Arctic: International Cooperation and Dispute Management," in The Polar Regions (1996), Chapter 7, p. 201.

118
Second Conference of Parliamentarians of the Arctic Region Conference Statement, Yellowknife, 14 March 1996.

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