The Russian Federation does not recognize any unilateral territorial or jurisdictional claim of other coastal States over a part of the Caspian Sea until these negotiations have been completed and the new legal status of the Caspian Sea is agreed.

On 25 May 2005, a US 3.6 billion pipeline linking the Caspian Sea to the Mediterranean was inaugurated.

The Caspian region accounts for 2 to 3 of the world s known oil resources about equal to that of North Sea oil. While far smaller than the deposits in Saudi Arabia or Iran, Caspian oil could prove important if oil production falls or is reduced for political reasons elsewhere.

Article 13 of the Framework Convention for the Protection of the Marine Environment of the Caspian Sea, 2003, Environmental emergencies

In 1993, Turkmenistan adopted an Act on State Frontiers, establishing that State's internal waters and territorial sea in the Caspian Sea.

Negotiations among coastal States with a view to developing a new treaty on the legal status of the Caspian Sea began in 1994 and are still in progress.

The pipeline is expected to carry crude oil from fields in the Caspian Sea off Baku to Tbilisi in Georgia, and to the Mediterranean terminal in Ceyhan, Turkey.

The examples selected also contained statements of general application, renouncing sovereignty over a Territory, or protesting about the legal regimes applicable to the territorial seas of Caspian Sea States.

And then, only a week and a half ago, we flew over the north pole of Titan and found, again, we found a feature here the size of the Caspian Sea.

Like the previous one, it is a protest note in response to the publication of the official draft Constitution, in which a part of the Caspian Sea is described as national territory.

The Russian Federation is of the opinion that the legal regime of the Caspian Sea is still determined by the above mentioned treaties until a new legal regime is agreed by the coastal States.

The figures are drawn from Roe to Ruin the Decline of the Sturgeon in the Caspian Sea and the Road to Recovery (Natural Resources Defense Council, Wildlife Conservation Society and SeaWeb, December 2000), pp. 2 and 3.

Our close partnership with the United Nations Environment Programme, the Caspian Ecological Programme, the Aral Sea Rescue Fund and a number of other international environmental initiatives shows how regional and global environmental protection issues can be tackled.

Sixth, we will consider a number of acts by the Russian Federation containing a protest, against the Republic of Turkmenistan and the Republic of Azerbaijan, respectively, in relation to the status of the waters of the Caspian Sea.

Some steps include implementing a strategic plan of activities to protect the environment of the Caspian Sea and developing national plans on the prevention of oil pollution, the increase of fish stocks, regulation of dangerous and toxic wastes and the prevention of transborder river pollution.

Much of this Caspian oil is in Kazakhstan, giving that country a critical role in the regional energy market. Moreover, Kazakhstan s strategic importance has increased as a result of recent revelations that the country s Kashagan oil field will produce 25 more than initially expected at peak production.

We practically can t buy caviar from the Caspian Sea any more. The European Space Agency announced in September 2007 that satellite photos showed that the Northwest Passage appeared clear of ice for shipping for the first time ever, and that the Northeast Passage is almost clear.

The first case refers to a protest formulated by means of a diplomatic note, dated 6 January 1994, addressed to the Government of the Republic of Turkmenistan on the occasion of the adoption of the State boundary law which establishes internal and territorial waters of that State in the Caspian Sea .

It should be recalled that, until the dissolution of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR), the legal status of the Caspian Sea was governed by the Treaty entered into with Persia in 1921 and the 1940 Commerce and Navigation Treaty between the USSR and the Islamic Republic of Iran.

The Caspian Sea being a body of water having no natural link with the global ocean in other words, a lake it is therefore not subject to the provisions of the international law of the sea, including those of the 1982 United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, unless agreed upon mutatis mutandis by all coastal States.

The objective of the note is, first, to inform Turkmenistan that the Russian Federation does not consider its claim and the actions based on it to be consistent with international law and the current legal regime governing the Caspian Sea, as defined in the 1921 and 1940 treaties between the USSR and the Islamic Republic of Iran.

4. Also welcomes the adoption of the Baku Declaration on energy cooperation in the region of the Black Sea Economic Cooperation Organization by the Ministers of Energy of the States members of the Organization on 19 September 2003 and the Joint Declaration by the Ministers of Transport from countries of the Black Sea and Caspian Sea region on 3 October 2003