Arctic Time

Very good eight-page cover-story on the Arctic grab in Time Magazine.

In this story, Anatoli Sagalevich, Head of the Deepwater submersibles Lab at the Russian Academy of Sciences, is quoted as saying "The Americans placed their flag on the moon, and it doesn't mean the moon became theirs". Well, there is under the aegis of the UN a 1979 Agreement Governing the Activities of States on the Moon and Other Celestial Bodies, also known as the Moon Treaty, which (among other provisions) bans all exploration and uses of celestial bodies without the approval or benefit of other states, declares that all states have an equal right to conduct research on celestial bodies, and bans altering the environment of celestial bodies. The US have not ratified the Moon Treaty, so yes maybe someone in the US considers that they own the Moon. [The Russian Federation has not ratified it either]

On their website, Time also offers a beautiful slide show with photos from a book by photographer Gueorgui Pinkhassov.