Parliamentary perspective on the Arctic Council.

• Author: Charles Caccia

In September 1996 a new international organization, the Arctic Council, was established. Earlier this year the Second Conference of Parliamentarians of the Arctic Region took place in Yellowknife. This article looks at the background of the parliamentarians and their attempts to form a working relationship with the Arctic Council.

The Second conference of Parliamentarians of the Arctic Region was attended by members from seven of the eight circumpolar nations, including Canada, Denmark, Greenland, Iceland, Finland, Norway, Russia and Sweden. Unfortunately the Congress of the United States was absent. Also in attendance were representatives of the Sami Parliaments, the Nordic Council, the West Nordic Parliamentary Council and the International Arctic Indigenous People's Organizations.

The Canadian delegation was headed by Clifford Lincoln and included MPs Karen Kraft-Sloan, John Finlay, Monique Guay, Keith Martin, and Senator Raynell Andreychuk. The Canadian delegation also included David Schindler, Professor of Ecology from the University of Alberta and Cindy Gilday.

The Canadian delegation articulated a definition of sustainable development that included elements around the environmental, social, economic, spiritual, cultural, historical and political.

The presentations on each theme emphasized the unique characteristics of the Arctic region and the need for broader co-operation among the eight Arctic countries. The Arctic is an important region globally and presents parliamentarians, governments and northern residents with profound cultural, socio-economic, political and environmental challenges and opportunities.

The Arctic region and its peoples are extremely sensitive to activities both within the region, and far from the Arctic. The parliamentarians were particularly struck by the number of speakers who raised the immediate and critical issue of toxic contaminants and their effect on the Arctic environment and its peoples.

The immediate and urgent threat to the Arctic environment of radionuclide contamination from various sources, including nuclear tests, scuttled nuclear submarines, and ice-breakers, and radioactive waste material, also was stressed. All governments were urged to co-operate and address this issue with haste.

Unanimous support from all delegations, in the form of a Recommendation, called for the immediate and expeditious establishment of the Arctic Council. An Arctic Council is considered to be the most effective way...