English Info: PhD

 

 

INFORMATION IN ENGLISH: PhD DISSERTATION
 

 

 
Régimen jurídico de la Antártida. Sus relaciones con las zonas marítimas del Océano Austral
 

Full text (pdf in Spanish)
 
 
 
 
Title: The Antarctic legal regime: its relationships with the maritime zones of the Southern Ocean
 
Abstract: The present doctoral dissertation is structured in two main parts. Part one deals with the legal and political situation of Antarctica until the adoption of the Antarctic Treaty in 1959. In its first chapter, the emerging of Antarctica in the international relations is studied. Accordingly, section one gives a special consideration to the history of Antarctica since its discovery at the beginning of the XIX century until the celebration of the International Geophysical Year in 1957-1958.
     Section two examines the failed efforts of seven States to claim sovereignty over parts of Antarctica and the political and diplomatic conflicts caused by these claims, as none of them gained international recognition. Chapter two analyses the search of an international solution for the Antarctic continent, which ended with the adoption of the Antarctic Treaty in 1959.
     Part two is wholly devoted to the implications of the Antarctic legal regime, as embodied in the Antarctic System, on the eventual maritime zones of the Southern Ocean. Its first chapter settles down that the existence of sovereign States in Antarctica is needed in order to affirm that there are maritime zones under national sovereignty or jurisdiction in the Southern Ocean. But, as long as this question has been frozen by the Antarctic Treaty, this chapter ends studying the legal basis for sovereign claims in Antarctica, as well as the maritime zones claimed before the adoption of the 1959 Antarctic Treaty.
     Chapter two examines the implications of the 1959 Antarctic Treaty on the maritime zones of the Southern Ocean. Its article IV establishes the agreement to disagree on the sovereignty question, which causes uncertainty about the legal existence of these maritime zones. After analysing the different legal interpretations carried out by the Contracting Parties, special attention is paid to the national policies followed both by claimant and non-claimant States.
     Finally, chapter three proves that, in spite of all these differences, the Contracting Parties have affirmed, through the main legal instruments of the Antarctic System, their collective jurisdiction over all the eventual maritime zones of the Southern Ocean.
 
Key words: International Law, Antarctica, Antarctic system, Law of the Sea, Southern Ocean, maritime zones, natural resources