One of the many geopolitical hot spots we monitor is Hans Island. From the Globe and Mail, June 10:
Canada and Denmark reach settlement over disputed Arctic island, sources say
Canada and Denmark have reached a settlement in a decades-old border dispute over Hans Island, a 1.3-square-kilometre rock in the Arctic sea passage between Greenland and Ellesmere Island, sources say.
The Inuit name for the island is Tartupaluk – describing its kidney-like shape – and under the agreement, a border will be drawn across the island, dividing it between the Canadian territory of Nunavut and the semi-autonomous Danish territory of Greenland.
The Canadians and Danes plan to unveil the settlement June 14 and celebrate it as an example of how countries can resolve border disputes peacefully even as Russia ignored the rules-based international order and launched a full-scale military assault on Ukraine, the sources say. The Globe and Mail is not identifying the sources because they were not authorized to speak publicly on the matter.
The dispute over tiny Hans Island dates back to the early 1970s when the countries were negotiating their maritime boundary; they left the status of the islet for future negotiations....
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Previously (August 2018), from Your Fact Boy:
Ever heard of Hans Island? Unless you are an overzealous Scandinavian legal scholar, chances are you haven’t. In short, It is a disputed rock.(or Island, call it what you will)
Within the Nares Strait (Between Greenland and Ellesmere) is half-a-square mile piece of rock called Hans Island, notable for absolutely nothing. No one lives there and while the area, generally, was once an Inuit hunting ground, there is little evidence that Hans Island itself is anything more than a dry rest stop across the Strait. To call Hans Island non-notable would, perhaps, be an understatement.
Nevertheless, Hans Island’s legal status is ‘disputed ‘: it is subject to conflicting claims, one by Denmark and another by Canada.
Which, of course, requires a colossally silly “war” which deserves to go down in history as either the most creative use of cross-border understanding to create a living satire out of territorial disputes or as the most humorous conflict of all time. But then again these are Danes and Canadians we are talking about.
But first, lets have some background. After all, we can’t study a ‘conflict’ without understanding the ‘severe’ political grievances behind it. It all began in 1973 when Denmark and Canada endeavored to map out the continental shelf dividing Greenland and Ellesmere. They ended up with the map, below, as a result, which placed Hans Island collinear with the points creating the boundary:
So why do you deserve to know about this conflict over a piece of rock ? Well, because of ‘how’ the conflict has turned out.
War ships from both sides patrol the area, and when they encounter each other they…wait-for-it…show their flags.
When the soldiers leave the ships they…wait-for-it…take the other side’s flag down and raise their own.
If this sounds terribly boring then read on. As successive Danish and Canadian landings on the island erect and dismantle flag poles and markers, they leave Bottles of Whiskey for the next contingent. This ‘whiskey war’ was initiated in 1984, when the Danish minister for Greenland landed on the island leaving a bottle of schnapps and a sign proclaiming “Welcome to the Danish Island.”
Peter Takso Jensen, head of international law department of the Danish Foreign Ministry, noted that
“When Danish military go there, they leave a bottle of schnapps. So when Canadian military forces come there, they leave a bottle of Canadian Club and a sign saying ‘Welcome to Canada’”
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Among the other perfidies of New Albion:Canada Makes A Move In The Arctic, Claims The North Pole: "Santa is Canadian eh"
