Pushing the boundaries
Lord Ma’afu, Tonga’s Minister of Lands, Environment, Climate Change, and Natural Resources was in New York recently at the United Nations (UN) headquarters to present a full submission from Tonga which has been granted continental shelf status of 60 nautical miles beyond its current 200 mile Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ).
A partial submission was made on 11 May 2009 to the Commission on the Limits of the Continental Shelf (UNCLCS), in accordance with Article 76, paragraph 8, of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea.
In accordance with the Rules of Procedures of the Commission, information containing the executive summary of the submission, all charts and coordinates were circulated to all the member states of the United Nations, as well as states that are party to the Convention.
Tonga was claiming 60 nautical miles in addition to its EEZ on its western border. But this was mapped as moving into the area of the Louisville Ridge, south of the Kermadec Trench, which is New Zealand’s continental shelf, one of earth’s deepest oceanic trenches (10,047 meters).
The New Zealand ambassador to the UN wrote a letter of support for Tonga’s continental shelf partial submission saying that it did not impinge on New Zealand’s outer limits of the continental shelf.
On the eastern border, Tonga was claiming the Lau Basin that bordered Fiji’s April 2009 partial submission to the UN claiming its continental shelf status.
Lord Ma’afu could not be more suited to this task, not only because of his extensive knowledge about continental shelf issues, but even for the reasons of history and nostalgia, as memories are recalled about his legendary relative, Chief ‘Enele Ma’afu, who ruled the Lau Group of islands until Fiji was ceded to Great Britain in 1874.
Chief Ma’afu, cousin of King George Tupou I, was initially sent over to Fiji to bring order to ‘unruly Tongans’ who were living in Fiji. But Chief Ma’afu not only brought order to the Tongans in the Lau Group— he also set up a governance system in which he presided as Tui Lau or King of Lau.
On the submission on the outer limits of the continental shelf of the Kingdom of Tonga to the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea in 2009, the following reference to an ancient claim by the founder of modern Tonga, King George Tupou I was quoted:
‘The Kingdom of Tonga is proud to have the longest continuous legal claim of historic title to maritime domain in the world,’ the document stated.
The Royal Proclamation issued by His Majesty George Tupou, King of Tonga, on 24th August 1887 claims national jurisdiction by the Kingdom of Tonga over ‘all, islands, rocks, reefs, foreshores and waters lying between the fifteenth and twenty-third and a half degrees of south latitude and between the one hundred and seventy-third and the one hundred and seventy-seventh degrees of west longitude from the Meridian of Greenwich.’
Eighty-five years later in 1972, Tupou I’s great, great grandson, King Taufa’ahau Tupou IV made a royal proclamation that the Minerva reefs belonged to Tonga.
On 15 June 1972, he proclaimed: ‘Whereas the reefs known as the Northern Minerva reef and Southern Minerva reef have long served as fishing grounds for the Tongan people and have long been regarded as belonging to the Kingdom of Tonga has now created on the reefs islands known as Teleki Tokelau and Teleki Tonga; and whereas it is expedient that we should now confirm the rights of the Kingdom of Tonga to these islands; therefore we do hereby affirm and proclaim that the islands, rocks, reefs, foreshores and waters lying within a radius of 12 miles thereof are part of our Kingdom of Tonga.’
But the issue requiring territorial clarification between Fiji and Tonga is of geopolitical significance for in 2005, Fiji made a submission to the International Seabed Authority denouncing Tonga’s royal proclamation over the Minerva reefs, north and south, by Taufa’ahau Tupou IV in 1972.
Tonga took this as an affront, because it showed political inconsistency with Fiji recognizing the royal proclamation in 1972, and again in September at the South Pacific Forum held in Suva. The Tongan military has safeguarded the beacons on these underwater reefs for 42 years until now.
Even though there has been very little public reporting on Fiji’s 2005 non-recognition of Tonga’s claim to the Minerva reefs, Teleki Tokelau and Teleki Tonga, tensions between the two countries flared in 2011.
The beacons on the Minerva reefs (north and south) manned by His Majesty’s Armed Services (HMAS) were removed and the structures damaged, allegedly by the Royal Fiji Navy.
His Majesty’s Armed Services were instructed to replace the beacons on Teleki Tokelau and Teleki Tonga, which they did. They also increased their patrol of the area, making the Tongan military presence felt.
But why is Fiji suddenly so interested in the Minerva reefs, making territorial claims that counter its initial recognition of Tonga’s claims to the reefs? What would be of great importance to Fiji to create a dispute with its closest friend and ally in the region?
Obviously the subsequent geopolitical issue, which Tonga’s full submission on the outer limits of its continental shelf raises, which is the relationship to deep sea mineral exploration and exploitation.
In 2012, Tonga was the second developing country after Nauru to be approved by the International Seabed Authority the right to state sponsorship of deep-sea mining companies in international waters.
A Canadian company Nautilus Mineral Limited formed a subsidiary in Tonga called Tonga Offshore Mining Limited, which was given a 15-year contract by the International Seabed Authority to explore for poly-metallic nodules in the Northern Pacific Ocean.
Tonga is the sponsoring state, and with its full submission on the country’s continental shelf gaining UN approval, what this does is consolidate Tonga’s right to sponsor deep-sea mining in the international waters outside its economic exclusive zone.
This will probably ignite border disputes in the highly contested Lau Basin between Tonga and Fiji over rights to sponsor deep-sea mining. This is why territorial clarification over the sovereignty of the Minerva reefs is integral to determining which country, Tonga or Fiji, will have greater geopolitical power and authority in the Lau Basin.
But why are the Minerva reefs, north and south, important to Tonga as sovereign territory? Both reefs are under water. The beacons require maintenance and because the area is contested by Fiji, it requires the Tongan military to patrol, survey and secure the area. This is a costly exercise, which Tonga can hardly afford.
But emotional attachment would have topped the list as the answer to why the reefs are important to Tonga. As King Taufa’ahau Tupou IV claimed, Tongans have been fishing in the area since time immemorial.
In 1962, four Tongan men were buried on the south Minerva reef, Teleki Tonga. They were shipwrecked and died from lack of water.
Tongan academic Dr Teena Brown-Pulu from New Zealand’s AUT University wrote: ‘The south Minerva reef is a Tongan mala’e. It belongs to Tonga by royal proclamation and in memory of four dead nationals.’
What are international bodies such as the United Nations and the International Seabed Authority doing to resolve the tensions from erupting into a border dispute that requires a military presence, on the high seas, to affirm a country’s sovereignty over its ocean borders?
‘Very little. If anything, their silence and inactivity on the matter is exacerbating disagreement and not helping to reach an outcome by diplomacy and negotiation according to international law and governance processes,’ said Dr Pulu, who has been an ardent researcher into Pacific marine issues.
‘This plays into the argument put forward by many non-Western states that the United Nations is the equivalent of an American led world order under NATO which is only concerned about matters of strategic and geopolitical importance to the West, meaning America and its lackey, the European Union.’
