Arctic Science Journeys
Radio Script
1997

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Fish Settle Border Dispute
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STORY: Alaskans celebrated Seward's Day recently, the day when in 1867 the United States purchased Alaska from Russia. By any account, Alaska was a bargain--7.2 million dollars for more than 500,000 square miles of land rich in fish, gold, oil, and awesome vistas. But few people know that for the last 130 years, neither the United States nor Russia knew just where the boundary is that separates the two countries.

Donald Lynch is a geography professor at the University of Alaska Fairbanks.

LYNCH: "And what happened is that at the time the Treaty of Cession of 1867 was signed, the actual boundary dividing the Bering Sea and the Sea of Okhotsk between Russia and the United States was drawn on a map. And the map has been lost. The issue between the United States and Russia is what projection was used on that map."

In geographic terms, projection is simply how lines are drawn from one point to another on a globe or a map. One method is called a Mercater projection. Lines run parallel and tangent to the equator--like a grid. But the method distorts land masses near the poles. It's why Greenland looks so much larger than it really is.

Another method is called conical projection. Its lines follow the curvature of the Earth. So, depending on the projection, the border is either closer to the United States or to Russia. The problem seemed resolved in 1990, when then-U.S. President Bush and former Soviet President Gorbechev agreed on a new border that split the difference between the two projections.

But the Soviet Union collapsed before the treaty was approved, and now Russian officials say the proposed border gives the United States too much of the Bering Sea's abundant pollock and other fish stocks. So what began as a border dispute has become a battle over fishing rights worth millions of dollars.

Valentin Parkhomenko is the senior counsel at the Russian Consulate in Seattle, Washington.

PARKHOMENKO: "I don't remember figures but as far as I remember there was something said about 150,000 tons of pollock as compensation in an annual quota from the American side if the treaty is to be ratified. But this is only a proposition, an issue of discussion. There is no firm decision on this."

From the perspective of U.S. negotiators, Russia's demand for fishing rights provides an opportunity to solve other long-standing issues in the Bering Sea. One key American concern is that Russian fishermen catch too many small, underage pollock. Stetson Tinkham is the senior Pacific fisheries officer with the U.S. Department of State.

TINKHAM: "It looked like there might be a way to address those conservation concerns about targeting on juveniles, or at least harvesting excessive numbers of juveniles in the Russian zone, and address the interests of the Russians, their repeated statement that they had somehow lost in the boundary negotiations because they were not allowed to fish in an area where they had once fished, and they were not allowed to catch a large amount of fish which they had once been able to catch there."

U.S. and Russian negotiators will meet the last week of May in the Russian Far East city of Petropavlovsk. There, the United States is expected to offer fish in exchange for Russia's promise to ratify the 1990 border agreement. In addition, they say an agreement to better manage the Bering Sea fishery will ultimately mean more fish for everyone. The State Department's Stetson Tinkham.

TINKHAM: "Conservation gains from measures put in place on the Russian side would have to be great enough so there would be a share of additional fish available for the Russians and a share of additional fish available for the United States."

Despite Cold War tensions that embroiled the United States and the former Soviet Union in conflicts throughout the world, the border between Alaska and Russia has remained peaceful. And both sides realize the importance of keeping it that way.

OUTRO: For Arctic Science Journeys, this is Debra Damron reporting from Fairbanks, Alaska.