The Russia–United States maritime boundary was established by the June 1, 1990 USA/USSR Maritime Boundary Agreement
[1990 USSR/USA Maritime Boundary Agreement]
/ref> (since Russia declared itself to be the successor of the Soviet Union
The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen national ...
). The United States Senate
The United States Senate is the upper chamber of the United States Congress, with the House of Representatives being the lower chamber. Together they compose the national bicameral legislature of the United States.
The composition and pow ...
gave its advice and consent to ratification as early as on September 16, 1991, but it has yet to be approved by the Russian State Duma
The State Duma (russian: Госуда́рственная ду́ма, r=Gosudárstvennaja dúma), commonly abbreviated in Russian as Gosduma ( rus, Госду́ма), is the lower house of the Federal Assembly of Russia, while the upper house ...
. This delimitation line is also known as the Baker-Shevardnadze line or Baker-Shevardnadze agreement, after the officials who signed the deal, Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Soviet Union Eduard Shevardnadze
Eduard Ambrosis dze Shevardnadze ( ka, ედუარდ ამბროსის ძე შევარდნაძე}, romanized: ; 25 January 1928 – 7 July 2014) was a Soviet and Georgian politician and diplomat who governed Georgia for ...
and U.S. Secretary of State
The United States secretary of state is a member of the executive branch of the federal government of the United States and the head of the U.S. Department of State. The office holder is one of the highest ranking members of the president's Ca ...
James Baker
James Addison Baker III (born April 28, 1930) is an American attorney, diplomat and statesman. A member of the Republican Party, he served as the 10th White House Chief of Staff and 67th United States Secretary of the Treasury under President ...
. In general concept, the 1990 line is based on the 1867 United States – Russia Convention providing for the U.S. purchase of Alaska.
From the point, 65° 30' N, 168° 58' 37" W the maritime boundary
A maritime boundary is a conceptual division of the Earth's water surface areas using physiographic or geopolitical criteria. As such, it usually bounds areas of exclusive national rights over mineral and biological resources,VLIZ Maritime Bound ...
extends north along the 168° 58' 37" W meridian through the Bering Strait and Chukchi Sea
Chukchi Sea ( rus, Чуко́тское мо́ре, r=Chukotskoye more, p=tɕʊˈkotskəjə ˈmorʲɪ), sometimes referred to as the Chuuk Sea, Chukotsk Sea or the Sea of Chukotsk, is a marginal sea of the Arctic Ocean. It is bounded on the west b ...
into the Arctic Ocean as far as permitted under international law. From the same point southwards, the boundary
Boundary or Boundaries may refer to:
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follows a line specified by maritime
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Geography
* Maritime Alps, a mountain range in the southwestern part of the Alps
* Maritime Region, a region in Togo
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* The Maritimes, the Canadian provinces of Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, and Princ ...
geographic positions given in the Agreement.[
]
Dispute
The need for the maritime boundary arose with the introduction of the 200-mile limit by the United States and the Soviet Union. The United States proposed using the 1867 Alaska line because it understood that to be the likely Soviet position. The 1990 delimitation was complicated since neither side could produce the maps used during the original Alaska purchase negotiations. Furthermore, the two sides agreed that the boundary was intended to be a straight line on a map, but they did not agree which map projection
In cartography, map projection is the term used to describe a broad set of transformations employed to represent the two-dimensional curved surface of a globe on a plane. In a map projection, coordinates, often expressed as latitude and longitud ...
was used: Mercator __NOTOC__
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** Mercator 1569 ...
or conformal. This resulted in about 15,000 square nautical miles of disputed area. The 1990 line split the difference between the two lines and introduced several "special areas", which were beyond the 200-mile zone, but in which the sides ceded their rights to the opponent. Many in Russia have criticized Mikhail Gorbachev
Mikhail Sergeyevich Gorbachev (2 March 1931 – 30 August 2022) was a Soviet politician who served as the 8th and final leader of the Soviet Union from 1985 to dissolution of the Soviet Union, the country's dissolution in 1991. He served a ...
and Edvard Shevardnadze for rushing the deal, ceding the Russian fishing rights and other maritime benefits, but so far both states have respected the line agreed in 1990. The United States continues efforts to enforce the boundary line against the encroaching Russian fishing vessels, in order to build up the evidence of "general state practice" that the 1990 agreement is indeed the marine border between the two countries.["US-Russian Bering Sea Marine Border Dispute: Conflict over Strategic Assets, Fisheries and Energy Resources", by Vlad M. Kaczynski, Warsaw School of Economics, ]
"Maritime Border Conflicts", ''Russian Analytical Digest'', no.20, 1 May 2007
/ref>
References
Further reading
International Boundary Study No. 14 (Revised) – October 1, 1965 U.S. – Russia Convention Line of 1867
{{DEFAULTSORT:USSR-USA Maritime Boundary Agreement
Geography of the Russian Far East
Boundary treaties
Russia–United States border
Soviet Union–United States treaties
1990 in the Soviet Union
Treaties concluded in 1990
Treaties not entered into force
Unratified treaties
International borders