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WATERS, TERRITORIAL
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See also:WATERS, TERRITORIAL . In See also:international See also:law " territorial waters " are the See also:belt of See also:sea adjacent to their shores which states respect as being under their immediate territorial See also:jurisdiction, subject only to a right of " inoffensive " passage through them by vessels of all nations. As to the breadth of the belt and the exact nature of this inoffensive right of passage, however, there is still much controversy. The 3-See also:miles' limit recognized and practised by See also:Great See also:Britain, See also:France and the See also:United States seems to have been derived from the See also:cannon range of the See also:period, when it was adopted as between Great Britain and the United States, i.e. towards the See also:close of the 18th See also:century. See also:Bynkershoek, a famous Dutch jurist, whose authority at one See also:time was almost as great in See also:England as in his own See also:country, in a dissertation on the Dominion of the Sea (1702), had devised a plausible juridical theory to support a homogeneous jurisdiction over environing waters in the See also:place of the quite arbitrary claims made at that time, to any distance seawards, from whole seas to range of See also:vision. Starting from the fact that fortresses can give effective See also:protection within range of their cannon, and that in practice this effective protection was respected, he argued that the respect was not due to the reality of the presence of cannon, but to the fact that the See also:state was in a position to enforce respect. This it could do from any point along its See also:shore. Hence his well-known See also:doctrine: tersae dominium finitur, ubi finitur armorum vis. The doctrine satisfied a requirement of the See also:age and became a See also:maxim of inter-See also:national law throughout See also:northern See also:Europe, both for the protection of shore See also:fisheries and for the assertion of the See also:immunity of adjacent waters of neutral states from acts of See also:war between belligerent states. See also:Germany still holds in principle to this varying limit of cannon range. See also:Norway has never agreed to the 3 m., maintaining that the See also:special configuration of her See also:coast necessitates the exercise of jurisdiction over a belt of 4 M. See also:Spain See also:lays claim to jurisdiction over 6 In. from her shores. The writers and specialists on the subject are quite as much divided. A See also:British See also:Fishery See also:Commission in 2893 reported that " the See also:present territorial limit of 3 m. is insufficient, and that, for fishery purposes alone, this limit should be extended, provided such See also:extension can be effected upon an international basis and with due regard to the rights and interests of all nations." The See also:committee recommended that " a proposition on these lines should be submitted to an international See also:conference of the See also:powers who border on the See also:North Sea." There is already an international See also:convention, dated 6th May 1882, between Great Britain, France, See also:Belgium, See also: The state has the right of sovereignty over a belt of sea along its coast subject to the right of inoffensive passage reserved in See also:article 5. This belt is called territorial waters (mer territoriale). Art. II. Territorial waters extend for 6 sea m. (6o to I degree of See also:latitude) from low-water mark along the whole extent of its coasts. Art. III. For bays, territorial waters follow the trend of the coast except that it is measured from a straight line drawn across the See also:bay from the two points nearest the sea where the opening of the bay is of 12 marine m. in width, unless a greater width shall have become recognized by an immemorial usage. Art. IV. In case of war the adjacent neutral state shall have the right to extend by its See also:declaration of neutrality or by special notification its neutral zone from 6 m. to cannon range from the coast. Art. V. All See also:ships, without distinction, have the right of inoffensive passage through territorial waters, subject to the belligerent right to regulate, and for purposes of See also:defence to See also:bar, the passage through the said waters for every ship, and subject to the right of neutrals to regulate the passage through the said waters for ships of war of all nationalities. Art. VI. Crimes and offences committed on board foreign ships passing through territorial waters by persons on board such ships, upon persons or things on board the same ships, are, as such, beyond the jurisdiction of the adjacent state, unless they involve a violation of the rights or interests of the adjacent state, or of its subjects or citizens not forming part of its See also:crew or its passengers. Art. VII. Ships passing through territorial waters must conform to the special rules laid down by the adjacent state, in the See also:interest and for the See also:security of See also:navigation and for the See also:police of the sea. Art. VIII. Ships of all nationalities, by the See also:simple fact of being in territorial waters, unless merely passing through them, are subject to the jurisdiction of the adjacent state. The adjacent state has the right to continue upon the high seas the pursuit of a ship commenced within territorial waters, and to See also:arrest and try it for an offence committed within the limits of its waters. In case of See also:capture on the high seas the fact shall, however, be notified without delay to the state to which the ship belongs. The pursuit is interrupted from the moment the ship enters the territorial waters of its own state or of a third See also:power. The right of pursuit ceases from the moment the ship enters a See also:port either of its own country or of a third power. 1 This act was passed to meet what was thought to be a defect in British law, the decision in the well-known " See also:Franconia " case having been that territorial waters were " out of the See also:realm," and that criminal jurisdiction within them over a foreign ship could be exercised only in virtue of an act of See also:parliament. 2 Proceedings, says § 3 of the act, for the trial and See also:punishment of a person who is not a British subject, and who is charged with any offence as is declared by this act to be within the jurisdiction of the admiral, shall not be instituted in any See also:Court of the United Kingdom, except with the consent of one of the See also:principal Secretaries of State, and on his certificate that the institution of such proceedings is in his See also:opinion expedient, and shall not be instituted in any British dominions outside of the United Kingdom except with the leave of the See also:governor of the part of the dominions in which such proceedings are proposed to be instituted, and on his certificate that it is expedient that such proceedings should be instituted. Art. IX. The special position of ships of war and of ships assimilated to them is reserved Art. X. The provisions of the preceding articles are applicable to straits not exceeding 12 m. in width, with the following modifications and exceptions: (t) Straits, the coast of which belong to different powers, See also:form part of the territorial waters of the adjacent states, their jurisdiction respectively extending to the See also:middle line of the straits; (2) Straits whose coasts belong to the same state, and which are indispensable for maritime communication between two or more states other than the state in question, form part of the territorial waters of the said state whatever the proximity of the two coasts may be; (3) Straits serving as a passage between one open sea and another can never be closed. Art. XI. The position of straits already regulated by conventions or special usage is reserved. The Dutch See also:government in 1896 brought these rules to the See also:notice of the leading See also:European governments, and suggested the desirability of concluding an international convention on the subject. The only government which was unfavourable to the proposal was that of Great Britain. (See as to the See also:Moray See also:Firth Fisheries controversy, NORTH SEA FISHERIES CONVENTION.) In the See also:Hague Convention of 1907 respecting the rights and duties of neutral powers in See also:naval war, the existing practice in regard to territorial waters is confirmed (see arts. 2, 3, 9, 10, 12, 13 and 18), but no definition of what constitutes the distance of these waters seawards is given. This question is among those which the next Hague Conference may deal with, inasmuch as for purposes of neutrality the difficulties connected with fishery questions do not arise d WATER-See also:THYME, known botanically as Elodea canadensis, a small submerged water-See also:weed, native of North See also:America. It was introduced into Co. Down, See also:Ireland, about 1836, and appeared in England in 1841, spreading through the country in ponds, ditches and streams, which were often choked with its See also:rank growth. Elodea is a member of the monocotyledonous natural See also:order See also:Hydrocharideae (q.v.). Additional information and CommentsThere are no comments yet for this article.
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