Law of the sea
The United Nations' sponsored conference on the law of the sea reconvenes in Geneva this week, attended by some 1,500 delegates from many nations. It is practically without an agenda, certainly without any direction or agreement between the participating states, and almost bound to end in the kind of futile confusion which marked earlier discussions in Chile. The law of the sea needs urgent reform, for there are many important questions at issue, nearly all of which arise out of the problem of redefining territorial limits, and the related problem of defining economic limits of exploitation. However, the question must be raised whether it is at all useful to seek a general international agreement on these and other matters, when it seems likely no matter what efforts are made, that no resolution will be arrived at. Far better, surely, for states to seek agreements locally, where there is some real possibility of compromise and agreement.
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