I wish to refer the readers attention to a feature article that appeared in another Sunday newspaper on August 10 (not the Sunday Times) under the title “Decom Project in a Mess” and draw the attention of the readers to my article published in The Sunday Times FT of April 1, 2007 captioned “Sri Lanka’s Case of the Continental Shelf” where I stressed the lack of transparency on this project since its inception.In 1999 a joint Cabinet Paper on this Project was submitted by the Minister of Foreign Affairs and the Minister of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources. Approval was given to seek assistance of the United Nations Commission on the Limits of the Shelf (UNCLS) for scientific and technical advice on compiling data including sediment thickness of over 1 kilometer and mobilize necessary local and foreign funds to complete this task.

There were no activity between 1999 and 2001 and the Director of the Geological Survey and Mines Bureau (GSMB) was the Head of the DECOM project. It should be pointed out that the GSMB had no mandate to implement the DECOM project.

A contract was signed on June 11, 2001 between the National Aquatic Resources Agency (NARA) Geological Survey and Mines Bureau (GSMB) and a Norwegian company called Ocean Geo Consultants (OGC) to formulate a project proposal for DECOM .The Director of this Norwegian company was a naturalized Sri Lankan. The total project costs were US $ 119,000 and was paid directly by NORAD to the Director of OGC through the Norwegian Embassy in Colombo. It is also noted that this Director charged US $ 90,000 as an honorarium!! This agreement was not approved by NARA and GSMB Boards of Directors and was signed by the Director General NARA and a Director of GSMB representing the Treasury. There is no approval of the Department of External Resources, Ministries concerned or the Cabinet of Ministers.

Further on September 18, 2001 another Joint Cabinet Paper was submitted by the Minister of Foreign Affairs and the Minister of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources. Approval was given for the total project costs of DECOM amounting to US$ 6.18 million (Rs 557 million) and a budgetary allocation of Rs. 84 million as local counterpart funding from 2002 to 2004 on the basis of Rs. 28 million each year. The cabinet paper referred to OGS but did not state the cost of US$ 117 000 paid by NORAD to OGS directly.

The cost breakdown of DECOM prepared by OGS was approved by Cabinet without any local scrutiny.
The foreign component of US$ 6.14 million was funded by NORAD under mixed credit The cost breakdown was critically analyzed by me in my submission in 2007.

I would also like to state the earlier contract for the off shore 2D seismic survey was awarded to a Norwegian company on 25 January 2006 which hired a Russian vessel from Singapore. It was confirmed that two Russians had died on board by alcohol poisoning according to the JMO’s report. This contract was later terminated. There was no sabotage from other countries.

GEMS of UK was subsequently awarded the contract for 6300 kilometers of 2D seismics and the cost estimated to be US $ 3,720,000 but was not to exceed US $ 5.2 million. A Norwegian vessel carried out the survey.

It is now learnt that NORAD has pulled out of the project, as they did not agree to pay the additional costs. It must also be stated that the Norwegian Petroleum Directorate (NPD) who were the implementing agency on behalf of NORAD appointed the Director of OGC (the naturalized Sri Lankan) as consultant to DECOM. Further the Director of DECOM, the former Director of GSMB, was paid US $ 1500 as his salary. This official is presently the Chairman of GSMB and it would be interesting to find out whether he was drawing two salaries.

I would like to state that the article published recently has a lot of false and erroneous statements and is silent on the events that occurred during the 1999 –2001 period. I would now try to elaborate problems arising from the scientific and legal interface on the claim to the extended continental margin as envisaged by DECOM.

Sri Lanka at the Conference maintained the application of article 76 of UNCLOS in the southern part of Bay of Bengal would be inequitable. As a consequence the Final Act of the Conference includes a “Statement of Understanding Concerning a Specific Method to be used in Establishing the Outer Edge of the Continental Margin.”

This method provides for the State notwithstanding Article 76 may establish the outer edge of its continental margin by straight base lines not exceeding 60 metres length connecting fixed points defined by latitude and longitude, at each of which the thickness of sedimentary rock is not less than 1 kilometer. The statement provides that a neighboring State may apply the same methodology on a common geological feature –Bengal Sea Fan. The statement is silent on States concerned, but it is understood to apply to Sri Lanka and India but to no other State.

The question therefore arises whether the Statement of Understanding would support the establishment of the outer limits of the continental shelf of Sri Lanka beyond 200 metre EEZ as it should be a submerged prolongation of the landmass of the coastal State (Article 76.1 and 76.3 of UNCLOS). The Statement of Understanding does not eliminate the requirement of natural prolongation. It only focuses on the inequitable application of article 76.4 (a) (i) and (ii) of UNCLOS and sets forth an alternative.

Further it is evident that the Bengal Fan is a geological feature composed of sediment largely from the Ganges –Brahmaputra catchment area. Contributions to this feature from Sri Lanka are very minor since there are no sediment rich rivers on the east coast. However the origin of sediments making up the submarine fan is not a criterion for establishing the continental shelf under article 76. Such a criteria will be impossible for the Bengal Fan as the sediments are derived from landlocked States in the Himalayan region.

However it would appear that the natural prolongation of Sri Lanka ‘ in the sense of the continental shelf does not extend beyond 200 miles. Therefore since the legal and scientific interface is complex in the case of the Bengal Fan it is doubtful Sri Lanka will be able to have jurisdiction over the extended continental margin as envisaged by the DECOM project on application of the Statement of Understanding of UNCLOS.

(The author is a retired Economic Affairs Officer of United Nations ESCAP who was in charge of Marine Affairs from 1990 to 2003)