[DRAFT] Convention On Settlement Construction

[Heliseum]

Convention on Settlement Construction
Category:Global Disarmament | Strength:Mild | Proposed by Heliseum

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The General Assembly,

Understanding the drive for nations to expand their territories, on land or by sea,

Concerned that nations may create settlements in foreign territories as a way to legitimize claims to that territory,

Reminded that the expansion of one nation is almost always accompanied by the decline of another,

Asserting that these practices sow instability and disrupts the fabric of international law,

Hereby:

Article 1 - Artificial Islands

1. Defines an artificial island as any landmass off of a nation's coast that has been constructed by people rather than formed by natural means.
   
   
2. Prohibits member nations from building artificial islands outside of their Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ).
   
   
3. Clarifies that artificial islands constructed following the passage of this resolution do not count towards their nation’s coastline, and thus do not extend the nation’s territorial waters or EEZ.

Article 2 - Strategic Emigration Practices

1. Defines a strategic emigration practice as any attempt made by a member nation or its political subsidiaries to incentivize, financially or otherwise, the emigration of its citizens into a specific foreign territory.
   
   
2. Prohibits member nations from employing strategic emigration practices without the consent of the government of the territory in question.

Co-author: United Massachusetts

[United Massachusetts]

We are looking for opinions about whether the use of "exclusive economic zone" counts as a generic enough term to avoid a house of cards with "Law of the Seas".

[Araraukar]

OOC: I'm guessing the relevant bits of LoS are these:

1. DEFINES the term ‘sea border’ as the point where waters meet the land at mean low tide, or where such a border would exist at sea level in the case of undersea nations;

2. ACKNOWLEDGES that, subject to any limits that WA law places on national rights and unless these terms would create conflicting claims,
A) Waters within 24 nautical miles (‘NM’) of a member nation's sea border, and any further waters that are enclosed by these, shall be considered that nation’s 'Territorial Waters' over which the nation shall have sovereign control and may enforce any and all of its own laws;
B) All of the waters within 200 nautical miles of a member nation's sea border, whether these are within its own Territorial Waters or are International Waters, and any further waters that are enclosed by these, shall be counted as its 'Exclusive Economic Zone' (‘EEZ’) within which it has sole authority over the exploration and use of natural resources;
C) Each of these zones also includes the relevant sections of sea-floor;
D) A nation’s territorial jurisdiction also extends over offshore installations located within its EEZ, and over ships registered in that nation while those are in International Waters;

I'll leave it to someone else to tackle the main clause and whether it means that future resolutions can completely ignore anything in clause 2, but if going by the usual proposal rules meaning of contradiction and duplication (relevant bits underlined), any "installation", whether an artificial island or an oil rig, would count for 2.D., but if it has land for the water to meet at low tide (as you'd imagine an artificial island to have), it'd count for Territorial Waters, and I'm not sure you can say it won't (barring the weirdness of main clause 2).

But even if clause 2 was ignorable due to its wording, the definition in LoS clause 1. would still apply to the artificial islands.

So I guess your issue with LoS is not whether EEZ counts as HoC issue, but rather whether your 1.b. and c. are in contradiction with LoS's clause 2.

You also need a better definition of an artificial island. Is a floating thing anchored to the seafloor an artificial island, if it's covered by soil and has things growing on it? What counts as "landmass"? Does dumping gravel on a barely-submerged seamount to raise its peak above the surface count as an artificial island? The landmass was there already, you merely made it visible on the surface.

Your Article 2 is completely detached from Article 1. Why are you even trying to stuff two uninvolved things in the same resolution? Article 2 is basically the RL Israel issue, while Article 1 is more like Netherlands/India/Philippines/China trying to extend their territory.

I also can't really see either issue to be Global Disarmament, given that Article 1 deals with geo-engineering, which I can't really think of a proper category for, unless it's rewritten properly to be an environmental issue. Article 2 is like the opposite of Civil Rights, as it seeks to restrict emigration. And I'm not even entirely certain if you can restrict emigration, because I'm fairly sure there's a resolution that specifically allows free emigration.

[United Massachusetts]

Hey, Ara. I have a couple of notes here:

• I really am not seeing contradiction with clause two, because its mandates are themselves "subject to any limits WA law places," including those of future resolutions. It could not possibly violate clause two. There is also no issue with clause one, as we have not even mentioned sea borders.
• Article Two and Article One deal with fundamentally similar issues -- attempts to artificially move national people and resources to a disputed area to bolster legitimacy. Israel and South China Sea are similar enough to be addressed in the same resolution.
• Global Disarmament is the best choice, insofar as this resolution prevents nations from funding certain programmes that would expand their territory. This seems akin to military spending.
• This resolution does absolutely nothing to restrict emmigration. It does restrict state attempts to sponsor emmigration.

[Kenmoria]

“In clause 1a, I suggest you clarify what ‘off of a nation’s coast’ means. Would being connected by a bridge count? How about a peninsula arrangement, where it is connected by a thin strip of land? I am also interested to see how artificial islands which are later joined to land would be affected by this proposal.”

[Araraukar]

as we have not even mentioned sea borders.

OOC: No, but you're talking about areas of sea, which are definitionally based on the sea borders.

Article Two and Article One deal with fundamentally similar issues -- attempts to artificially move national people and resources to a disputed area to bolster legitimacy.

...I don't see anything about moving people nor people moving in Article 1, nor does Article 2.a. mention anything about it being foreign claimed territory (as with Israel). So you need to add moving people to 1 and disputes to 2.a. to make it actually do what you're saying it does. And no, 2 doesn't automatically apply to 1, especially as LoS makes "installations" the jurisdiction of the nations that built them, and thus they're not foreign.

Israel and South China Sea are similar enough to be addressed in the same resolution.

Yeah because it's totally similar to forcibly relocate people at gunpoint to bring in your own, and building an island outside of anyone's territorial sea area.

Global Disarmament is the best choice, insofar as this resolution prevents nations from funding certain programmes that would expand their territory. This seems akin to military spending.

So how does this REDUCE police/military spending? It's not enough that "it prevents nations from funding X", it has to actively reduce the spending.

It does restrict state attempts to sponsor emmigration.

...now I'm stuck with the idea of you grating someone named Emmi (it's a female name over here). So if all it does is restrict emigration sponsoring, again, that doesn't reduce police/military spending. Nor would emigration sponsoring increase them. (Actual actions might.)

Something else that came to mind, can Nation A ask Nation B (which is a WA nation, and has much more experience with this) to build an artificial island in their EEZ? It would be outside Nation B's EEZ, but inside Nation A's. Article 2 allows this kind of exception for moving people.