Rockall, the 33rd county?

mikemac

Only messing with the title!
I've been hearing about this rock for years. I thought we were the closest country to it but possibly that's incorrect.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rockall#Irish_claims_to_areas_around_Rockall

Excellent article on Wikipaedia but it's not clear if this was ever resolved and near the end it states:

It is in the interests of Ireland, UK, Denmark and Iceland to come to a deal on the division of the seabed area.

So not clear to me at all.
Is it in our interest to try to claim it, possibly fishing rights can be enforced?
I certainly don't see a negative point about owning it

Anyone have a better understanding on the whole legal situation.

Fratton Fred

mikemac wrote: »

Only messing with the title!
I've been hearing about this rock for years. I thought we were the closest country to it but possibly that's incorrect.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rockall#Irish_claims_to_areas_around_Rockall

Excellent article on Wikipaedia but it's not clear if this was ever resolved and near the end it states:


So not clear to me at all.
Is it in our interest to try to claim it, possibly fishing rights can be enforced?
I certainly don't see a negative point about owning it

Anyone have a better understanding on the whole legal situation.

I don't think it is whats swimming around rockall that is of interest, its the dead dinosaurs buried in the seabed that people are after.

Anyway, I think it is nearer Scotland than Ireland.

Permabear

This post has been deleted.

mozil

For this rock is part of Ireland, 'cos it' s written in folklore
That Fionn MacCumhaill took a sod of grass and he threw it to the fore,
Then he tossed a pebble across the sea, where ever it did fall,
For the sod became the Isle of Man and the pebble's called Rockall.

Soldie

Perhaps we could re-locate Dáil Eireann - fresh seafood and beautiful sea-views. It'd also make the public protests that bit more interesting.

A Dub in Glasgo

mozil wrote: »

For this rock is part of Ireland, 'cos it' s written in folklore
That Fionn MacCumhaill took a sod of grass and he threw it to the fore,
Then he tossed a pebble across the sea, where ever it did fall,
For the sod became the Isle of Man and the pebble's called Rockall.

Prefer the chorus me self

'Oh rock on Rockall, you'll never fall to Britain's greedy hands
Or you'll meet the same resistance that you did in many lands
May the seagulls rise and pluck your eyes and the water crush your shell,
And the natural gas will burn your ass and blow you all to hell'

Fratton Fred

A Dub in Glasgo wrote: »

Prefer the chorus me self

'Oh rock on Rockall, you'll never fall to Britain's greedy hands
Or you'll meet the same resistance that you did in many lands
May the seagulls rise and pluck your eyes and the water crush your shell,
And the natural gas will burn your ass and blow you all to hell'

must be a real bastard having to live with all those nasty Brits.:rolleyes:

Mycroft H

Firstly we are the closest mainland point to it so it should be ours.

Its not the rock we would be interested in, it would be the rich fishing grounds that surround it, ie the 'rockall bank'

mike65

Feck teh fish, its the oil and gas, man! The gas and oil.

Thirdfox

Don't the British assert their claim by having 2 SAS soldiers stay overnight on the rock once a year? I recall our international law professor saying that a few soldiers have died as a result of getting falling off the rock.

Just like the Japanese putting up a lighthouse over a disputed "rock" in the South China Sea (much to the outrage of China)...it's all about the oil, strategic military/trade routes etc. (Diaoyutai v. Senkaku and Dokdo v. Takeshima (Korea v. Japan) island disputes).

mike65

I think he was "self declared".

Permabear

This post has been deleted.

BlitzKrieg

I was gonna ask was it possible to stay over night on the rock?

Permabear

This post has been deleted.

Thirdfox

He he - you know your politics - yup. Some patriotic citizens put up a temporary "lighthouse", it was blown down during a storm and then they went back and put up a more permanent one I think.

I believe the Chinese navy might have sent a sub there at one point - the Japanese then sent their destroyer/coast guard after it...all a lot of posturing by both sides. Whereas with Rockall I don't see any probability of patriotic Irish citizens flying the tri-colour off the rock (though it would make for an interesting international crisis to distract us from the recession).

FTA69

Doesn't look like there's much going on there to be honest, I'd like to see that snyde b*stard Bear Grylls survive on that place for a month.

Dannyboy83

comical thread

Sean Templar

Soldie wrote: »

Perhaps we could re-locate Dáil Eireann

Great idea,I like it.So your saying we would use it as a prison colony ,like australia was for the british?.

turgon

At the risk of sounding like a communist, couldnt we all just share and be happy?

Now, who gets the top...

Morpheus

<<< Update >>>

from irish times yesterday:

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/ireland/2009/0401/1224243794901.html
Ireland to bring Rockall oil and gas claim to UN

THE GOVERNMENT is set to make a claim to the United Nations for control of gas and oil exploration rights potentially worth billions of euro around Rockall, following the failure of years of negotiations with Denmark, Iceland and the UK.

The Cabinet yesterday approved a joint memorandum from Minister for Foreign Affairs Micheál Martin and Minister for Communications, Marine and Natural Resources Eamon Ryan to expand Ireland’s ownership of exploration rights off both the southwest and west coasts.

Under the proposal accepted by Ministers, Ireland will extend the State’s share of the continental shelf by 39,000 sq km 200 miles (322km) off the southwest coast, in line with the United Nations Commission on the Limits of the Continental Shelf in 2007.

More significantly, however, Ireland is to make its own claim to the UN commission for oil and gas exploration rights around Rockall – the ownership of which has been contested for decades – following the failure of talks with Denmark/Faroe Islands, Iceland and the UK.

Ireland agreed boundaries in the region with the UK in 1988 but the agreement has never been accepted by Iceland or Denmark – which acts for the Faroe Islands on foreign affairs issues.

The four states have held irregular negotiations since 2001, but recently accepted they would not be able to reach an agreement, and agreed that the matter should be left over for UN arbitration.

The Rockall claim, to be lodged by Minister for Foreign Affairs Micheál Martin before the arbitration deadline in May, will extend Ireland’s claim up to 500 miles off the west coast, covering all of the so-called Hatton-Rockall area.

Under the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea, Ireland, Iceland and the UK have until May to submit their claims to the Commission on the Limits of the Continental Shelf, but Denmark has until 2014 to do so.

The four-way talks collapsed because of differences between Iceland and the UK, whose political room for manoeuvre was limited following the election of the Scottish Nationalists to power in Edinburgh.

The British Labour Party has been sensitive to allegations levelled by Scottish Nationalist leader Alex Salmond that London was prepared to “sell off” Scottish oil rights.

Iceland demanded that the sides had to agree on a division of the spoils together before submitting the agreement to the United Nations body, rather than allowing it freedom to draw up its own maps.

Under the 1982 United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, coastal states are entitled to claim rights over waters 370km off their shores, subject only to not interfering with the rights of other states.

This gives Ireland rights over 400,000 sq km, though the new claims are now based on the premise that Ireland’s continental shelf naturally extends beyond the 370km limits, and thus its exploration rights should extend far beyond that.

The first claim off the south-west coast in an area known as Porcupine Abyssal Plain is not contested by any other state, and it has already been deemed to be Irish continental shelf by the UN. Regulations will now be drawn up by Mr Ryan to claim it officially.

In a second 80,000 sq km plot in an area straddling the Celtic Sea and the Bay of Biscay, the boundaries have still not been agreed with the UK, France and Spain, although all four have lodged a joint submission to the UN body.

Lockstep

It's incapable of supporting life on it's own, so it's pointless as far as the Law of the Sea goesvas regards to Exclusive Economic Zones.

Morpheus

And from The Guardian - looks like everyone wants a bit!
http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2009/apr/01/britain-iceland-hatton-rockall-oil

Rockall claim puts Britain on collision course with Iceland


Britain has lodged an application for thousands of square miles of the seabed around the Atlantic outcrop of Rockall - embarking on what could be a diplomatic collision course with Iceland and the Faroes.

The submission for the potentially oil-rich territory was delivered yesterday to the UN Commission on the Limits of the Continental Shelf (UNCLCS) in New York.

The unilateral claim for part of the North Atlantic zone, known as the Hatton-Rockall basin, follows the breakdown of years of negotiations between the UK, Ireland, the Faroes, and Iceland.

"We are disappointed that agreement on joint action has not proved possible," the Foreign Office said. "We hope [other countries] do not feel the need to dispute the UK's submission." There is a May deadline for states that were early signatories of the UN treaty to post their claims; the UK is expected to lodge another application for the disputed continental shelf around the Falklands in the coming weeks.

Rockall, the eroded cone of an extinct volcano, stands only 70 feet above the sea and is regularly washed over by Atlantic breakers. For decades ownership was disputed between Britain and Ireland in the belief that possession would deliver control over the surrounding waters.

A change in the UNCLCS rules, however, meant that isolated outcrops could not generate territorial claims.

The UK now measures its extended continental shelf claim - which under the UN regulations can stretch up to 350 miles offshore - from the outlying Hebridean island of St Kilda.

r0nanf

The rock's only permanent inhabitants are periwinkles and other marine molluscs.

What a line...

Pablo Sanchez

It may be uninhabited now but if we get control of it and set a few developers loose they will have apartments up in a second.

To paraphrase one of South Dublins most pompus developments:

"few locations generate this sort of dream"

Allah Hu Akbar

Pablo Sanchez wrote: »

It may be uninhabited now but if we get control of it and set a few developers loose they will have apartments up in a second.

To paraphrase one of South Dublins most pompus developments:

"few locations generate this sort of dream"

Building has already begun