Maritime boundaries

International law

International law states that maritime boundaries shall be resolved in the first instance through bilateral negotiations between the states concerned. The objective is to arrive at a boundary that both parties perceive as legitimate. In such negotiations, two main principles are often applied:

1. The median line principle
   This means that the boundary is drawn so that each point on the line is equidistant from each states’ coastlines. The principle works well when the coastal geography is symmetrical.
   
   
2. The fairness principle
   When the median line produces an unreasonable result – for example due to concave coastlines, islands or other special circumstances – the boundary can be adjusted. This principle was strengthened by the 1982 Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS), which stated that the final delimitation must be “fair”, not necessarily mathematically symmetrical.

If two states are unable to reach an agreement through negotiations, the case can be brought before the International Court of Justice (ICJ) or the Tribunal for the Law of the Sea (ITLOS).

Conflicts in the North Sea

In the North Sea, several conflicts arose in the late 1960s and early 1970s. These concerned both rights and delimitations.

The most well-known are the North Sea continental shelf cases from 1969 between Germany, Denmark and the Netherlands. Germany claimed that the median line principle would give the country a skewed and excessively small area of the shelf due to its concave North Sea coastline. Denmark and the Netherlands, on the other hand, believed that the median line principle from the 1958 Convention should apply.

The International Court of Justice (ICJ) then concluded that the median line was not a binding practice, and that the basis had to be the principle of fairness. The court did not adjust the boundary itself, but gave clear guidelines for how the states should arrive at a fair delimitation.

The judgement had a major impact on further delimitations in the North Sea and laid the foundation for modern practice in maritime law.

Another type of potential conflict in the North Sea concerned shared oil and gas reservoirs that cross state boundaries. Petroleum deposits follow natural geological structures and not political boundaries, and the Statfjord and Frigg fields, for example, straddle the Norwegian-British boundary. When a reservoir extends across a political boundary, production on one side can affect the resources on the other. To prevent such “drainage”, Norway and the UK had to enter into a so-called unitisation agreement, in which they agreed on shared operation and a distribution scheme based on the actual extent of the reservoir.

Norway's agreements

Norway's agreements have largely been resolved through such bilateral negotiations with combinations of median line, adjustments for special circumstances and historical use.

The most difficult agreement was the delimitation agreement with Russia in 2010. For several decades, both countries claimed the right to a large area of the Barents Sea. After lengthy negotiations, the parties came to a settlement which divided the area equally between the states.

Another example is the case between Greenland (Denmark) and Jan Mayen (Norway) in 1993, where the ICJ adjusted the median line to create a balanced settlement based on coastal conditions, resources and historical use.

Agreements on maritime boundaries deal with law, geology and geopolitics. The North Sea shows how valuable assets and complex coastlines can create conflict, but also how countries can find solutions through negotiations and the principles of international law. Norway has mainly resolved maritime delimitations through early diplomacy, and by placing great emphasis on international law.

If you want to learn more about this, listen to the episode: “Oil fields on the boundaries” from our podcast Reflections on Norway's oil story (in Norwegian only).