Colonial Legacies and Strategic Minerals in the Blue Pacific

In early June 2025, the European Union announced 13 strategic raw materials projects outside its borders, spanning both terrestrial and marine domains. This initiative, worth €5.5 billion in capital investment, includes land-based operations such as New Caledonia's established nickel processing facilities and the Tungsten West project in Devon, England. Moreover, the CaledoNi project in New Caledonia exemplifies how former colonial powers continue leveraging territorial relationships for land-based resource access, where French sovereignty over the territory provides clear legal authority despite growing autonomy demands.

Nevertheless, the distinction between land and sea governance proves particularly consequential in French territories. In French Polynesia, territorial authorities exercise broad competence over terrestrial mining under the 2004 so-called "autonomy" statute, while the state retains control over "strategic raw materials". By contrast, marine resources present a different calculation. Article 47 of the autonomy law grants French Polynesia regulatory authority over "biological and non-biological resources" within its Exclusive Economic Zone, potentially including certain seabed minerals. As a result, this creates an ambiguous zone where French strategic material prerogatives might clash with Polynesian maritime sovereignty, particularly since the 1959 decree defining strategic materials predates modern understanding of rare earth deposits.

Meanwhile, the United States has embarked on an even more audacious strategy for marine resources. President Trump's Executive Order 14285, signed in April 2025, authorizes American companies to pursue deep-sea mining in international waters outside the International Seabed Authority's oversight. Furthermore, this maneuver bypasses the multilateral framework governing the "common heritage of mankind" principle that applies to international seabed areas beyond national jurisdiction. Indeed, The Metals Company has confirmed it will abandon ISA licensing procedures in favor of this new US regulatory pathway, covering 25,000 square kilometers in the Clarion Clipperton Zone where no territorial sovereignty exists.

The legal architecture governing these activities reflects centuries of evolving maritime law. While terrestrial mining operates under clear territorial sovereignty, deep-sea mining in international waters theoretically falls under the ISA's authority as established by the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea. On the one hand, the ISA's mandate treats seabed resources as humanity's common heritage and therefore requires benefit-sharing with developing nations. Trump's executive order effectively creates a parallel regulatory system that circumvents these multilateral obligations, potentially triggering what critics call a "free-for-all" in international waters.

Accordingly, Pacific Island nations occupy different positions depending on whether resources lie within their territorial boundaries or EEZs versus international waters. For instance, countries like Nauru have sponsored deep-sea mining applications through the ISA for areas beyond national jurisdiction, expecting revenue-sharing arrangements. Similarly, China's ambassador to Nauru, Lu Jin, characterized the US approach as trampling international law while offering Chinese cooperation in accelerating ISA-approved mining. This positioning reveals how great powers frame their interventions differently for land-based operations under clear sovereignty versus marine resources governed by international law.

And the numbers illustrate the scale of this bifurcated system. Specifically, the EU's strategic projects include seven land-based extraction operations in countries with established territorial authority, from Serbia's Jadar lithium project to Kazakhstan's Sarytogan graphite extraction. In contrast, these terrestrial operations proceed under bilateral agreements with sovereign states, while marine projects like the Norgraph operations spanning Norway and Greenland navigate more complex jurisdictional arrangements involving EEZ boundaries and continental shelf extensions.

In response, Pacific Island leaders have articulated distinct approaches for land and sea. The 2050 Strategy for the Blue Pacific Continent emphasizes oceanic stewardship as fundamental to Pacific identity, while acknowledging terrestrial sovereignty remains with individual nations. Likewise, the 2021 Pacific Islands Forum Declaration on Preserving Maritime Zones addresses specifically marine boundaries threatened by sea-level rise, asserting that EEZ boundaries established under UNCLOS should remain permanent regardless of climate change impacts.

Historical precedents reveal how this land-sea dichotomy has been exploited. Nuclear testing programs by Britain, France, and the United States between 1946 and 1996 predominantly targeted marine environments and atolls, areas where sovereignty claims appeared weaker or populations could be more easily relocated. Notably, the 67 tests in the Marshall Islands and 193 total tests in French Polynesia were conducted largely on islands and ocean areas rather than major population centers, which reflects colonial calculations about expendable territories.

Therefore, this historical pattern informs current debates over deep-sea mining, where environmental uncertainties echo past dismissals of Pacific marine concerns. The Metals Company's pivot to US regulations allows it to avoid ISA environmental assessments that would apply in international waters, while potentially operating in areas where Pacific Island nations have sponsored applications expecting benefit-sharing arrangements. Consequently, this creates a situation where the same seabed resources might be accessed through competing legal frameworks with different environmental standards and benefit distribution mechanisms.

Furthermore, the linguistic dimensions of these debates reflect the land-sea regulatory divide. Terrestrial mining discussions often occur within established national frameworks where indigenous languages and customary law systems have some recognition, whereas deep-sea mining negotiations proceed primarily in international forums mostly conducted in major metropolitan languages. Translation services that understand these cultural contexts become particularly important for marine resource discussions too, where Pacific concepts of oceanic relationships often lack equivalent terms in European legal frameworks.

Now, recent developments suggest that the regulatory distinction between land and sea may be breaking down under geopolitical pressure. Trump's executive order explicitly frames deep-sea mining as a national security imperative, potentially extending territorial sovereignty concepts into international waters through unilateral regulatory assertion. As a consequence, this approach treats the ocean as an extension of terrestrial resource competition rather than a global commons requiring multilateral governance.

The EU's Raw Materials Coalition has raised concerns about this trend, noting that strategic projects abroad lack proper safeguards regardless of whether they occur on land or sea. Their statement highlighted that 54% of energy transition minerals are located on or near indigenous lands, while marine indigenous rights receive even less recognition in international law. For example, Serbia's Jadar lithium project, opposed by local communities, demonstrates how terrestrial sovereignty provides some avenues for resistance that may not exist for deep-sea operations in international waters.

Ultimately, the trajectory of strategic mineral politics in the Pacific will likely determine whether the twenty-first century witnesses a convergence of land and sea resource governance under great power competition or the preservation of distinct legal frameworks that recognize different forms of sovereignty and stewardship. The stakes extend beyond economics to fundamental questions about whether international law can maintain meaningful distinctions between territorial sovereignty and global commons in a context of intensifying resource competition. How these tensions resolve will shape not only Pacific Island sovereignty but the broader architecture of international resource governance for generations to come.