Subject: [No Subject]<br/>
Date: Jul 29, 2005 @ 21:18<br/>
Author: Doug Murray (Doug Murray &lt;doug@...&gt;)<br/>
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<div id="ygrps-yiv-652451363">This just in:<br/>
<br/>
Inuit, expats, foreigners weigh in as Canada-Denmark Internet war goes global<br/>
<br/>
By Alexander Panetta<br/>
<br/>
   OTTAWA (CP) -- An Internet war between Canada and Denmark has gone global.<br/>
   Web watchers around the planet have been drawn into a tussle between a Canadian patriot and an unknown Danish adversary over an uninhabited Arctic island claimed by both countries.<br/>
   E-mails have been fired off from Norway, South Korea and the United States, and Internet news sites in South Africa and Britain have covered the dispute over tiny Hans Island.<br/>
   &quot;It&#39;s been fascinating,&quot; said Rick Broadhead, the Toronto Internet expert who launched a web page on Canada&#39;s behalf on the Google website.<br/>
   &quot;It was amazing to watch it sort of expand across the globe, and then the e-mails started to flood in.<br/>
   &quot;Canadians are very passionate. I&#39;m really impressed.&quot;<br/>
   It&#39;s not just Canadians. Broadhead is getting e-mails from friends -- and foes -- around the world.<br/>
   He launched his website to counter claims by a similar one linked to a Danish government press release.<br/>
   There&#39;s even a third website now -- a spoof site for a group that calls itself the Hans Island Liberation Front.<br/>
   &quot;The people of Hans Island yearn to breathe free! Free from the oppression of Canadian and Danish interlopers!&quot; says the site.<br/>
   The dispute over the island -- a frozen block of rock barely larger than a football field between Nunavut and Greenland -- broke out again last week after Defence Minister Bill Graham visited it by helicopter to bolster Canada&#39;s claim.<br/>
   The Danes called it &quot;an occupation&quot; and suggested they would ramp up their own presence in the area.<br/>
   The story went international after it was sent out by The Canadian Press and picked up by The Associated Press and the British Broadcasting Corporation&#39;s website.<br/>
   As one e-mail writer to Broadhead said, the issue runs deeper than that barren heap of stones.<br/>
   As global warming heats up the Arctic&#39;s economic potential for mining and shipping, territorial sovereignty over the north may become contested like never before.<br/>
   &quot;Hans Island in more than a hunk of rock . . . Hans Island is THE symbol of Canadian will for the entire north,&quot; said one Inuit who sent Broadhead an e-mail.<br/>
   &quot;The world is watching. If we flinch, then we can kiss the Northwest Passage goodbye. . . and that&#39;s just the beginning.<br/>
   &quot;I am an Inuit. I WILL defend Hans Island.&quot;<br/>
   One Norwegian letter-writer was clearly siding with his Danish neighbours.<br/>
   &quot;Watch out on this one or I will have the Americans officially take over your country,&quot; he told Broadhead. &quot;The island is Danish.&quot;<br/>
   The Americans weren&#39;t exactly massing their tanks along the 49th parallel but at least one Yank offered his support.<br/>
   &quot;I&#39;m American, but I&#39;ll back Canada on this dispute! Hope you guys will support us when France wants New Orleans back.&quot; <br/>
   One Canadian living in Korea felt as red-faced as the Maple Leaf by the territorial squabble on the shores of his homeland.<br/>
   &quot;How can I be proud when the second largest country in the world is being pushed around by some tiny little place in Europe?&quot; said the writer, who signed his message, &quot;Sincerely, feeling disgraced.&quot;<br/>
   Canada and Denmark have allowed the dispute to go unresolved for three decades. In 1973 they agreed on a maritime boundary between Greenland and Ellesmere Island but couldn&#39;t come to an agreement on Hans.<br/>
   The Danish government has asked repeatedly to reopen negotiations over rights to the frigid rock. Canada has not responded.<br/>
   Perhaps the most intriguing proposed solution came from someone in British Columbia who wrote to Broadhead.<br/>
   &quot;Maybe we should just draw a boundary down the middle of the island and welcome the new neighbours,&quot; he wrote.<br/>
   &quot;Let&#39;s face it our neighbors to the south . . . give us grief from time to time.&quot;<br/>
<br/>
-----<br/>
On the web:<br/>
-- www.rickbroadhead.com/hans.htm<br/>
-- www.um.dk/en/servicemenu/News/FrontPageNews/HansIslandDanishNoteToCa nadianAmbassador.htm<br/>
-- www.hansislandliberationfront.com/<br/>
17:08ET 29-07-05<br/>
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