martin
can you or anyone explain what is meant by
the enclave
in the following unexpurgated text of message 8898
which however i have interrupted below just to point out the passage
in question
--- In
BoundaryPoint@yahoogroups.com, "Martin Pratt" <m.a.pratt@d...>
wrote:
> Below are some extracts from the analysis of the Canada-France
maritime
> boundary in the American Society of International Law's
authoritative
> series "International Maritime Boundaries". As far as the long-
running
> boundarypoint discussion on this boundary is concerned, the key
comment
> is at the end of the first paragraph: "Turning points 4 and 5 are
fixed
> on the low-water marks of Canadian islets in the Little Green Island
> group, a rather unusual feature for a maritime boundary. These
islets
> are the westernmost of the Canadian offshore features." This
suggests to
> me that while there is land territory immediately on one side of the
> boundary, there is no actual land boundary....
>
> When I get an opportunity, I will have a look through Peter
Beazley's
> technical report (published in Vol. 31 of International Legal
Materials)
> and see if he has any comments on relationship between the boundary
and
> the Little Green Island group.
>
> Regards,
>
> m a r t i n
>
>
> EXTRACTS FROM INTERNATIONAL MARITIME BOUNDARIES
>
> There are quite a number of islets, rocks, drying rocks, banks, and
> shoals in the boundary area. Most of the offshore features used as
> basepoints for measuring the boundary are rocks, although turning
points
> 1, 2, and 3 are, on their west, measured from a French islet,
L'Enfant
> Perdu. In general, when a boundary turning point is determined on
the
> basis of equidistance from the respective basepoints, that basepoint
> closest to the boundary on the French side has been chosen, while
the
> nearest Canadian basepoints have been ignored. An exception are the
> Outer Miquelon Rocks, about 4 n.m. west of turning point 7, which
were
> ignored in determining the point's location. Turning points 4 and 5
are
> fixed on the low-water marks of Canadian islets in the Little Green
> Island group, a rather unusual feature for a maritime boundary.
These
> islets are the westernmost of the Canadian offshore features.
>
> Banks and shoals were ignored as basepoints in the delimitation.
Since
> the drying rocks on both sides of the line are located within the
> respective territorial seas, they could, legally, generate their own
> territorial waters, and thus would qualify as potential basepoints
for
> determining the boundary. No islets were ignored in the delimitation
> except for Canada's Green Island, a part of the group of islets near
> Points 4 and 5, which was disregarded because it would have
exercised a
> disproportionate effect on the boundary.
>
> *****
>
> To deal with technical difficulties, as mentioned at the outset, the
> Court of Arbitration appointed as its expert Commander Peter
Beazley of
> the United Kingdom. In his Technical Report to the Court, Commander
> Beazley explained that all computations were made on the ellipsoid
using
> North American Datum (1983), the associated ellipsoid being that of
the
> Geodetic Reference System (1980). The International Nautical Mile
of
> 1852 meters was used. Positions of relevant basepoints were taken
by
> the expert from Canadian charts, with corrections supplied by the
> Canadian Hydrographic Service, and all coordinates were expressed
to 0.1
> arc seconds. 71 The line of delimitation was illustrated on the
> largest-scale chart of the area available, Canadian Chart No. 4490.
>
> The first technical problem noted by Commander Beazley in his
report to
> the court was that the coordinates listed in the Agreement between
> Canada and France of 27 March 1972 were expressed only to the
nearest
> arc second. While the Canadian Memorial had applied datum
corrections,
> the French pleadings had not assigned coordinates to either point 1
or
> point 9, the terminal points of the agreed delimitation (in the
channel
> between Newfoundland and St. Pierre and Miquelon) and consequently
the
> starting points for the delimitation by the Court of Arbitration.
> Further, point 1 as described in the 1972 Agreement and corrected
for
> datum change, did not lie exactly on a 12 n.m. arc centered on
L'Enfant
> Perdu. The expert therefore assumed that, had the coordinates been
> given to the nearest 0.1 arc second back in 1972, they would have
been
> slightly different.
ok here it comes
the enclave
in the sentence just below
> With respect to the enclave, as regards basepoints on St. Pierre and
> Miquelon, while the French Memorial listed the coordinates of an
> equidistant line, the controlling basepoints were only named and
their
> coordinates not given. The Canadian Counter Memorial did give
> coordinates for the basepoints used by Canada for the French
islands,
> but a comparison with the French equidistant coordinates showed
that the
> two parties could not be using identical points. Commander Beazley
> observed that "[t]his is only to be expected from the scales of the
> charts even if the features used were the same." Therefore, he
> determined his own coordinates of the basepoints for the French
islands,
> although the coordinates differed only slightly from those given by
> Canada.
>
> Other problems for Commander Beazley arose in the context of
determining
> the corridor, which, it will be recalled was to extend "to a
distance of
> 1988 nautical miles from a 12 nautical miles limit measured from the
> baselines" on St. Pierre and Miquelon. The western and eastern
limits
> of this projection were determined by the extremities of the French
> islands, and the expert had to determine the distance between the
> meridians passing through these points at their mean latitude.
Also,
> the limits described by the court for the lateral boundaries of the
> corridor were actually "small circles" and were neither geodetic
lines
> nor rhumb lines. A geodetic line was a closer approximation, but
> because positions were given to the nearest 0.1 arc, it was
necessary
> for the expert to determine two intermediate points along each
limit in
> order to reduce the divergence of the geodesics from the small
circles.
>
> ==================================
> Martin Pratt
> Director of Research
> International Boundaries Research Unit
> Department of Geography
> University of Durham
> South Road
> Durham DH1 3LE
> United Kingdom
>
> +44 (0)191 374 7704 (direct line)
> +44 (0)191 374 7702 (fax)
> m.a.pratt@d... (email)
> http://www-ibru.dur.ac.uk (World Wide Web)
> ==================================