Settled maritime boundaries and gas exploration
BANGLADESH had disputed maritime boundaries with Myanmar in the east and India in the west ever since its independence. Two landmark verdicts given by two international courts have put an end to these long-drawn disputes between the three neighbouring nations. On March 14, 2012, the Germany-based International Tribunal on the Law of the Sea (ITLOS) settled the dispute between Bangladesh and Myanmar by refixing the maritime boundary between these two nations. On July 7, 2014, another international court, the Netherland-based Permanent Court of Arbitration (PCA) settled the dispute between India and Bangladesh by refixing the maritime boundary between the two countries. The verdicts are binding on the nations and there is no scope of appeal. Thus, the settlements are permanent, and have been unconditionally accepted by the three nations.
For the questions, who are the winners and who the losers, the answers are less well defined. The fact is that there are wins and losses for all the three parties. In Bangladesh, the celebration over the “maritime victory” is more of political propaganda rather than reality. Nonetheless, the conclusions of the two verdicts have clearly marked an end to the conflicts, a long felt requirement for political, economic and military health of these nations. It was more so for Bangladesh than its neighbours because Bangladesh faced active opposition in both of its boundary areas whenever activities like gas exploration, fishing, etc. were undertaken.
The Bay of Bengal has been the prime exploration area for oil and gas for all the three countries for many years. In the not so distance past, there had been incident of military showdown when Myanmar was seen actively engaged in gas exploration in the water claimed by Bangladesh. India, at another point in time, compelled an international oil company to withdraw exploration programme from Bangladesh because the water in question was disputed. These are a few examples of how the three nations play out with each other in dealing with their disputed sea boundaries.
As far as petroleum resources are concerned, the settlement of the maritime boundary could not have come at a better time. The demand for gas in all the three nations has outpaced their respective supplies. With the increase in prospects of oil and gas reserves in the Bay of Bengal over the last five years, this area had been even more vulnerable to conflict as more and more exploration programmes were taken up by one and disputed by the other. That the solution has finally come has been a relief to all the three nations in question. While Myanmar and India both have already taken up extensive exploration programmes in their respective areas, Bangladesh is yet to launch a comparable drive.
In 2008, Bangladesh declared an offshore block map showing 10 shallow-water blocks and 20 deep-water blocks, and put these up for international bidding from international oil companies (IOC). The initial response from the IOCs was unexpectedly low, therefore a second bidding was announced with new dates for bid submission. When this also failed to draw a reasonable response from the IOCs, Bangladesh softened a number of production sharing contract (PSC) terms in favour of the foreign companies. Even that did not bring a reasonable response from IOCs. Only a handful of companies showed interest and even fewer actually entered into negotiation. A follow up of the events pointedly showed that one of main reasons for the low IOC turn up in block bidding was the maritime boundary dispute between Bangladesh and its neighbours. The IOCs were reportedly warned by the neighbours of negative consequence of engaging in exploration in a disputed sea area.
In the meantime, in March 2012, ITLOS announced its verdict on the maritime boundary dispute between Myanmar and Bangladesh. According to the verdict, Bangladesh lost to Myanmar almost all the offshore blocks adjacent to the Myanmar boundary. Those included blocks 13, 18, 22, 23, 26, 27 and 28, covering an area of about 21,300 sq.km. Curiously enough, this aspect was held back from public eye by the much hyped media coverage of the government sponsored “ocean victory” celebration across the country. Yet there were many who pointedly asked, how could Bangladesh lose so many offshore blocks to Myanmar? A government representative was clear while answering the above question. According to him, Bangladesh did not seek any legal or technical advice from any quarter while drawing the deep sea blocks along Myanmar sea boundary in the wake of offshore block bidding in 2008. Rather, the blocks were drawn arbitrarily, ignoring international rules. This was in a sense a violation of international norms. So, the question is, how could Bangladesh be so outrageously ignorant of international rules while projecting itself in the international community?
On July 7, 2014, the Netherland-based international court announced its verdict on the maritime boundary dispute case between India and Bangladesh, and it was published the next day. Contrary to what many in Bangladesh anticipated, the verdict overwhelmingly went in favour of Bangladesh. All the offshore blocks along the maritime boundary with India remain in Bangladesh, except for a very minor area of a few blocks along the western edge. The Indian claim of a 162 degree line for the maritime boundary was not accepted by the court. Rather, the court finalised a 177.5 degree line for the boundary, which deviated only by 2.5 degree from what Bangladesh claimed. The court did not accept India's proposal for adopting equidistance principle for working out the boundary. Instead, the court agreed to use principle of equity as the working method, as Bangladesh had proposed. Bangladesh certainly gained more in boundary delimitation case with India as compared with Myanmar.
With the settlement of maritime boundaries between the three neighbouring nations by international court, they can only look forward. With major gas discovery in the India and Myanmar side of the Bay of Bengal over the last several years, Bangladesh can now seriously venture to explore all its offshore blocks.
The writer is Professor, Department of Geology, University of Dhaka.
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