Three French Nationals freed with a help from Oman

Published November 14, 2011| Associated Press

PARIS – Three French aid workers held hostage by Al Qaeda militants in Yemen have been freed after nearly six months in captivity, thanks to help from the sultan of Oman and a possible ransom payment, officials said Monday.

Kidnappers linked to Al Qaeda's offshoot in the region had demanded $12 million in exchange for the three and had threatened to kill the hostages if ransom wasn't paid imminently, according to Yemeni officials.

Somalis and one Yemeni charged with piracy and kidnapping

By Tom Schoenberg - Mar 10, 2011 11:38 PM GMT+0400

The U.S. Justice Department charged 13 Somalis and one Yemeni with piracy and kidnapping in connection with the seizure and death last month of four Americans on a yacht in waters off the coast of Oman.

Saudi-Oman road construction gathers pace

By P.K. ABDUL GHAFOUR

ARAB NEWS

Published: Dec 25, 2010 23:20 Updated: Dec 25, 2010 23:20

JEDDAH: Saudi Arabia has stepped up efforts to open its first land border point with Oman in 2012 by constructing 592 km of road through the Empty Quarter, one of the largest deserts in the world. “We have completed 89 percent of the road project,” said Transport Minister Jabara Al-Seraisry.

دورة كأس الخليج العربي العشرين

http://www.yemengulfcup20.com/

Oman has stripped Ali Salem al Beed of hiz Omani citizenship

Oman has stripped an exiled former Yemeni vice-president of his citizenship for intervening in his home country's politics.

Ali Salem al-Beed, who fled from Yemen in 1994 after a civil war erupted there, lost his right to stay in the Sultanate of Oman on Friday.

He violated the conditions of his citizenship in calling on residents of south Yemen to fight for liberation, the Omani authorities said.

Al-Beed, whose attempt to secede from north failed in 1994, said in Germany on Friday that the international community should force the Yemeni government to withdraw its army from the south.

Old divisions

There were clashes in Yemen on Thursday over the country's 1990 unification - part of ongoing protests that have threatened to reopen the country's old north-south divide.

At least four people died in the violence, which broke out in the capital Aden a day before the anniversary of the union - one marked by unity celebrations, political speeches and military parades.

A security official in Aden said police shot into the air to disperse the crowd, but did not confirm or deny any deaths or injuries.

He emphasised that the protest had not been officially approved. The protests are reportedly being organised by the Southern Movement, a loose coalition of groups opposed to the government in Sanaa, the capital.

Protesters sang independence songs, highlighting the depth of separatist sentiment in the south where living conditions are worse than in the rest of the country.

But in his anniversary-day address, Ali Abdullah Saleh, the Yemeni president, gave warning that those who want to secede would fail as they did in 1994.

He said the country's unity was "solid and blamed "outlaws" for the violence, which he said aimed "to hit at the nation and its safety and to stir unrest".

Multiple threats

Saleh has cautioned in the past against the risk of Yemen splitting into "several entities". In addition to the southern unrest, Yemen's government also faces the risk of a potential rebellion by Shia Zaidi Muslims living in the north.

Saleh announced during his speech that his government had plans to change the constitution and develop the political and electoral system so as to grant more power to provincial rule in an effort to attract investment.

Southern Yemen is home to four million people, whereas the north's population is more than 20 million. For decades southerners have complained of jobs and land being reserved for the northerners.

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http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middleeast/2009/05/200952210176702671.html

Continental Shelf claims increase rapidly

By NATHANIAL GRONEWOLD, Greenwire

UNITED NATIONS -- The U.N. commission charged with checking and certifying nations' claims to seabed stretching hundreds of miles from their shorelines is getting very busy very fast.

The Commission on the Limits of the Continental Shelf -- a body of specialized undersea geographers and hydrographers established under the 1982 Law of the Sea Convention -- has seen its workload double from late last year, fulfilling its members' predictions of a backlog that could take years to resolve.

From 2001 through 2007, just nine claims were put forward as more advanced Law of the Sea Treaty countries surveyed their continental shelves. Giant claims submitted by Brazil, Australia and New Zealand were approved in 2007 and 2008, freeing those nations to prospect for hydrocarbons, mineral deposits or methane hydrates in their newly minted control zones.

But since Japan issued its sweeping claim to Pacific Ocean territory last November, many smaller states have leaped into the fray.

All told, the commission now has 22 applications, some of which include partial claims by the United Kingdom and France over sea bottom around their colonies. Nine claims arrived since Japan's submission, with five of those coming in the first three months of this year.

The newcomers include Burma, Mauritius, Yemen, Suriname and Seychelles. Claims by Uruguay and the Philippines arrived just last week in time for the 23rd session of the commission that wrapped up here Thursday.

And more applications are expected. Canada, Denmark, Portugal, South Africa, South Korea, Vietnam and a few others have said they are conducting surveys and preparing claims. Applications by Argentina, India, Kenya, Maldives, oil-rich Angola and more could arrive next month.

But the commission is working its way through earlier claims as applications pile up.Of the 22 claims, the commission has fully reviewed and given full or partial approval to just five. For example, the commission has confirmed the Russian Federation's 2001 claims in the Pacific Ocean and the Barents Sea, but it has told Moscow that it needed better data to review its attempt to control a huge swath of the Arctic.

The commission is still working its way through 2006 applications. Commission members are expected to issue their opinion soon on claims off Europe's west coast spelled out in a joint application by the E.U. states of Spain, France, Ireland and the United Kingdom.

Work will also soon be concluded on the commission's review of claims made by Norway in the Arctic and Atlantic and a small claim by Mexico for control of a patch of territory in the deep waters of the Gulf of Mexico. Commission members speaking on background say these three applications are sound and will likely win approval.

Tensions rise

Diplomatic tensions are rising with the applications as dormant territorial disputes resurface.

In February, China and Korea responded critically to Japan's claim to seabed off distant islands that it controls. The dispute centers around Okinotori, an outcrop that is found nowhere near Korean or Chinese waters. The two claim Japan's Okinotori is in fact a rock, not a habitable island, and therefore does not qualify under Law of the Sea rules.

"Available scientific data fully reveal that the rock of Oki-no-Tori, on its natural conditions, obviously cannot sustain human habitation or economic life of its own, and therefore shall have no exclusive economic zone or continental shelf," the Chinese government says in its letter to the U.N. secretary-general.

And more serious conflicts are emerging. France has signaled its intention to claim continental shelf abutting the islands of St. Pierre and Miquelon, French territories very close to the east coast of Canada. The Canadian government has issued a strongly negative reaction, insisting that France and Canada have already settled on a maritime boundary through a bilateral treaty.

Argentina's forthcoming application is expected to include seabed surrounding the Malvinas, otherwise known as the Falkland Islands, which are controlled by the United Kingdom.

The most serious potential for disputes is in the Arctic, where Canada, Denmark, Norway and Russia all have competing claims.

Russia says it controls land beneath the North Pole, though Canadian media reports suggest there is growing evidence that Denmark could have a stronger claim through its administration of Greenland. Canada and Denmark still have unresolved territorial disputes in the high Arctic, and Russia and Norway have not fully delineated their maritime borders there.

Currently, the United States, Canada and Denmark are cooperating in exploring and mapping the subsurface features of the Arctic, gathering scientific data that will likely go into future submissions to the U.N. continental shelf commission.

But the United States is not legally eligible to participate in the process, as Congress has yet to ratify the Law of the Sea. Commission members have in the past said that they would most likely have to ignore a U.S. application if Washington submits one.

Copyright 2009 E&E Publishing. All Rights Reserved.
For more news on energy and the environment, visit http://www.greenwire.com/.

Published in

http://www.nytimes.com/gwire/2009/04/13/13greenwire-rising-seabed-claims-swamp-un-commission-10511.html

Oman to assist Yemen in hosting Gulf 20th football championship

MUSCAT, Feb. 03 (Saba) -

Oman voiced on Tuesday its readiness to offer its all expertise and cadres to succeed the Yemeni host to the Gulf football Cup 20th in 2010.Deputy Minister of Youth and Sport Hashed al-Ahmer discussed in the Omani capital, Muscat, with its Omani counterpart Rashad al-Hana'ai the possibilities to exchange experiences and visits in the future.The meeting discussed cooperation relations between the two countries in the various sporty fields.Al-Ahmer expressed his congratulations for al-Hana'ai on the first-ever winning of the Omani football team for Gulf football Cup 19th held in Oman.

AF/AFSaba

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http://www.sabanews.net/en/news175326.htm

A meeting of Arab Countries on Red Sea Piracy

CAIRO, November 1 (RIA Novosti) - Egypt has announced it will host a meeting of Arab countries on Red Sea piracy in November, the Egyptian Foreign Ministry said Saturday.

"Egypt has sent invitations to Arab countries having access to the Red Sea to take part in a meeting to coordinate efforts and develop means of fighting against the problem of piracy," the ministry said.

The meeting will be held "at a high level" under the common chairmanship of Egypt and Yemen.
Egypt also said that the growing problem of piracy in Somalia was spreading to the Red Sea.

At the beginning of June, the UN Security Council passed a resolution permitting countries to enter Somalia's territorial waters to combat "acts of piracy and armed robbery at sea."

According to UN data, in 2008 Somali pirates seized about 60 foreign ships for ransom. Their aggregate "revenues" this year could reach $30 million.

Published in

http://en.rian.ru/world/20081101/118091633.html

Locust swarms in Oman and Yemen update 18 February 2008

New reports indicate that a few locust swarms are present in Oman and Yemen. In southern Oman, an immature swarm was reported on 11 February in the Dhofar hills near Salalah. On the 13th, there was an unconfirmed report of a large immature swarm in northern Oman on the southern side of Jebel Akhdar near Al Hamra. Ground control operations were in progress earlier in the month in the central interior against late instar hopper bands and immature adults from local breeding that occurred near the Marmul oil fields and the coast. There is an increasing risk that a few swarms could reach the Batinah coastal plains in northern Oman and perhaps cross the Gulf to the Baluchistan coast in southeastern Iran and western Pakistan.

In eastern Yemen, two immature swarms were seen in the Al-Mahra region near the border of Oman between Hat and Shehen of 14 February. There is a high risk that a few swarms could move back and forth along the Yemen / Oman border.

In Ethiopia, immature locust swarms up to about 5 square km in size continue to be reported east of the Rift Valley in the highlands of Oromiya region, mainly in Borena, Arsi and Bale zones, and in southern Somali region in the past few days. Survey and control operations are difficult because of the mountainous terrain and because the swarms are highly mobile. Consequently, there remains a risk that the swarms could move several different directions: (1) south to northern Kenya, (2) west towards SNNPR region, (3) north to Djibouti and cross Bab el Mandeb to Yemen, (4) northwest into the Danakil Depression and to the southern coast of Eritrea, (5) northeast across the Somali plateau to the Gulf of Aden coast in northern Somalia, or (6) reinvade the Ogaden in eastern Ethiopia. In any case, swarms in the Horn of Africa will mature and lay eggs with the onset of the long rains (about March).

The above-mentioned countries should remain on high alert and take the necessary steps to monitoring the situation carefully and undertake control operations as necessary to reduce the threat to crops and livelihoods>

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http://www.reliefweb.int/rw/RWB.NSF/db900SID/SHIG-7BXDDP?OpenDocument

Eritrea and Yemen Boundary

Cdre Md. Khurshed Alam Ndc, Psc Bn (Retd) *

It is rare that an international tribunal awards total victory to one party in a maritime boundary dispute. This appears to be almost inevitably so even in situations where strict application of legal principles to the geography of the situation would seem to require that result. Two maritime boundary arbitrations- the 1999 Eritrea v Yemen and Qatar v Bahrain case under the 1982 Law of the Sea Convention (UNCLOS) merit discussion.

The international law of maritime delimitation has been the subject of considerable examination during the past half century. The history of the development of the law through the cases, starting from the 1969 North Sea Continental Shelf cases, has been well documented and it would be better to focus on both the maritime boundary cases decided under the UNCLOS. First of all, we would like to discuss the Eritrea and Yemen case, which was the delimitation of a single maritime boundary.We find that the arbitration about the Eritrea and Yemen case was conducted before an ad hoc Tribunal under the auspices of the Permanent Court of Arbitration.

The case involved a dispute between Eritrea and Yemen States about sovereignty over the Red Sea area between them and in the second phase - the maritime delimitation that took place after the tribunal had already allocated between them sovereignty over the four sets of contested mid-sea islands. The tribunal stated at the outset that it would approach the delimitation using the proposition that a median line fits the requirements of UNCLOS articles 15, 74 and 83. Both Parties in turn claimed that their proposed delimitation line was based on the median line. The Parties differed with respect to the effect that should be given to the mid-sea islands, whose sovereignty had been decided in the first phase.

The Tribunal recognised that the provisions of UNCLOS required an equitable result achieved. Its role was to examine whether giving the mid-sea islands full or partial effect would achieve the desired result. The Tribunal examined in general terms whether giving the islands a certain effect (full or partial) would produce a disproportionate effect on the maritime boundary, depending on their size, importance and like considerations in the general geographical context.

The Tribunal divided the maritime area between the Parties into three different sectors North, Middle and South for the purpose of the delimitation. In the North, it maintained that the delimitation was essentially a mainland-to-mainland delimitation between the Parties' opposite coasts. In the Middle, it held that the delimitation became complicated by the presence and proximity of the mid-sea islands. The Tribunal concluded that the boundary would have to be moved to the west in order to take into account overlapping Territorial Sea and three sets of mid-sea islands. The Tribunal gave the mid-sea islands certain partial effects, but did not explain its methodology. Interestingly, the Tribunal rejected various arguments made by Yemen in relation to the Middle sector that would have given it control over all the shipping lanes in the southern Red Sea.

In the South, the Tribunal again used a coastal median line. Perhaps the most notable aspect of the Eritrea/Yemen Award was its treatment of the traditional fishing regime of the Parties in the Red Sea. In both phases of the arbitration, the Parties put forward claims to the effect that their nationals relied significantly on the Red Sea fishing industry and fish consumption. The first Award decreed that the sovereignty found to lie within Yemen entails the perpetuation of the traditional fishing regime in the region, including free access and enjoyment for the fishermen of both Eritrea and Yemen. The Tribunal based its decision to recognise and give effect to the traditional fishing regime on what it referred to as local custom and Islamic law. The texts of the Awards, however, do not reflect a profound examination of either source of law.

In any event, the Tribunal's treatment of Islamic law does assist in bringing a new dimension to the exact nature of the rights and obligations imposed by the Awards under the aegis of the protection of the traditional Red Sea artisanal fishing regime. The Tribunal clarified that the obligation imposed on Yemen in relation to its sovereignty over the mid-sea islands extended to requiring Yemen to enable Eritrean fishermen to exercise their entitlement to fish around the islands and even use the islands freely for such traditional activities as drying fish, repairing boats and nets, establishing and using way stations, and taking shelter. The Tribunal took the view that the obligation also required Yemen to permit artisanal Eritrean fishermen to fish up to its mainland coasts and to permit them to land their catches in Yemeni ports.

Shortly after the Award was issued, the Parties met to discuss various aspects of their fishing activities in the Red Sea. It transpired that they had differing views of the Award on the issue of the traditional fishing regime and Eritrea requested a clarification from the Tribunal. A decree issued by the Tribunal in response to this clarification that Yemeni fishermen did not enjoy a right to fish off Eritrea's continental coast inside the internal waters of the Dhalak Islands in the northern sector. This ruling was particularly significant because the best fisheries in the Red Sea are around the mid-sea islands (awarded to Yemen in the first phase), off Yemen's mainland coast, and around Eritrea's Dhalak Islands. The effect of this clarification meant that, while the Eritrean's could fish around Yemen's fishing grounds in the Red Sea, Yemenis could not fish off Eritrea's fishing grounds.

Thus the benefit of the protections afforded to the traditional artisanal Red Sea fishermen in effect fall substantially to Eritrea. Ultimately, despite the Tribunal's post-award attempt to clarify the scope of the traditional fishing regime, it appears that the issue might still be considered by some to be far from clear. From the court rulings and the articles referred above, it can be derived that the land dominates the sea, right to maritime territory, whether Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) or Continental Shelf (CS), derives from sovereignty over its adjacent land territory and also in areas of overlapping Territorial Sea (TS) are to be divided by the median or equidistance line method, unless variation is required by historic title or special circumstances. The tribunal also dealt the issue of Islamic law for the first time in so far as the maritime boundary is concerned.

The Eritrea-Yemen Arbitration unanimously resolved the disputed territorial sovereignty over the Red Sea islands and the delimitation of international maritime boundary, to the satisfaction of both Parties and to the benefit of the consolidation of peace and security in one of the strategically most sensitive regions of the world, the solution of which had been awaited since the end of the First World War. With its recognition of a traditional fishing regime and crystallization of the criteria for maritime delimitation, it also made a significant contribution to the development of international law. The arbitration awards provide a notable instance of the role of dispute settlement by an international court on the basis of law, including the 1982 UN Law of the Sea Convention. The Award is a milestone in the development of principles and rules of international law governing the acquisition of territorial sovereignty as it confirms the pre-eminence of evidence of actual and effective occupation as a source of title to territory over claims of historic title. It sustains a low standard for what would constitute actual occupation as it relates to unsettled or inhospitable territory. At the same time, the Award provides a landmark decision substantiating the development of the modern law of equitable maritime boundary delimitation.

It confirms prominence of a single all-purpose maritime boundary and the governing role of equidistance (median line) as the equitable boundary between the opposite states. The Award substantiates the critical roles played in achieving the equitable result by considerations pertaining to baselines (normal and straight), islands, reefs and low-tide elevations, navigational factors and interests of third states, as well as by the principle of proportionality in terms of a posterior test of the equitableness of a result arrived at by other means.

The Tribunal's treatment of islands, islets, rocks and low tide elevations confirms that their definition and entitlement granted or denied to these maritime features depend on the degree to which they distort an equidistant line and other factors (such as comparison of coastal lengths abutting on the claim area), rather than on their legal status per se. Although the resource related factors did not ultimately influence the actual course of the Eritrea/Yemen single boundary line, the Tribunal's respective holdings importantly reappraise the international legal regime governing common mineral deposits on the one hand, and the role of fisheries factors in equitable maritime boundary delimitation on the other. The implementation by Eritrea and Yemen of this regime, of which substantive content was defined in the 1999 Award as applying to artisanal fishing and as involving the right of free passage and other associated rights, provide an interesting evidence on practical implementation of the Islamic concept of territorial sovereignty. The Awards are undoubtedly to continue to provide a valuable model for successful settlement of disputes in the two interlinked major areas of the acquisition of territorial sovereignty and maritime boundary delimitation in the future. We, in Bangladesh, are sitting far too long on the settlement of issues of the maritime boundary with both India and Myanmar. This is a good case study as the land of Bangladesh also dominates the seabed under the Bay of Bengal and our fishermen from all the coastal districts in a large number rely on fishing. Without which their very survival would be in stake and there are ample facts and figures in support of this. Both India and Myanmar are known to be bent upon using equidistance line as the line for maritime boundary demarcation with Bangladesh. But with both countries our coastline does not lie as exactly as an adjacent coast as in case of other countries. So we must study the methods through which we can prove our historic title or develop our case as relevant as special circumstances, or bring in the Islamic law as enunciated earlier, so as to get the advantage of the area likely to be lost due to following the equidistance line. Time is running out from our side on the delimitation of maritime boundary primarily because of our ignorance on the importance of the issue both at the political level as well as at the level of the ministry. Only the Ministry of Foreign Affairs can probably justify such long silence and inaction over the issue of maritime boundary delimitation with both India and Myanmar.

*The author is freelancer and an expert on maritime issues.

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