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INUVIK and OTTAWA — The timing couldn't be better for Prime Minister Stephen Harper, who has jetted to the Far North this week to champion Canada's Arctic sovereignty as the clock ticks down to a possible election call.
Arctic icecap experts say that a deepwater route through the fabled Northwest Passage has become temporarily navigable because of fast-melting ice.
This offers foreign cargo freighters and tankers a speedier route between the Atlantic and Pacific than the Panama Canal, especially if the navigable period lengthens in future years as expected.
The development reinforces the point of Mr. Harper's trip: that other countries have designs on the Arctic - whether for shipping or petroleum riches - and Canada needs to step up to protect its interests.
Prime Minister Stephen Harper poses for a photograph with residents in Inuvik, 200 kilometres north of the Arctic Circle, on Tuesday. (Todd Korol/Reuters)
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It's the second year in a row a deepwater route through the Northwest Passage has opened up - and, some believe, only the second time in recorded history.
The late-summer melt, caused by global warming, reminds Canadians just how strategically vital their polar backyard has become. But getting foreigners, including Americans, to seek Canada's permission to travel through the Northwest Passage - which the military now calls "Canadian Internal Waters" - will be tough.
It's precisely the sort of turf-protection hot button Mr. Harper plans to push this week in a three-day tour that takes him from Inuvik on the Mackenzie Delta to Tuktoyaktuk on the shore of the Arctic Ocean to Dawson City, Yukon, home of a 19th-century gold rush.
In an Ottawa statement designed to set the tone for his trip, Mr. Harper announced $100-million for a major project to map the Far North's mineral and petroleum wealth.
"Use it or lose it is the first principle of sovereignty in the Arctic," he said just before he flew to Inuvik, 200 kilometres north of the Arctic Circle and the northernmost Canadian town that's accessible by road. (Inuvik locals also boast of having the northernmost traffic stoplight, which is anchored in the permafrost outside Mr. Harper's hotel.)
The Prime Minister's trip is scripted as a pre-campaign tour, with each day to include an announcement related to one aspect of his northern policy, first on the economy, with geo-mapping, then the environment, then sovereignty.
The geo-mapping effort - to accelerate the extraction of northern riches - comes as an international land rush for petroleum deposits heats up throughout the Arctic Circle. Russia, the U.S., Canada, Norway and Denmark are all staking out part of the Arctic continental shelf in a process expected to leave countries at odds over conflicting claims.
An increasingly ambitious and oil-rich Russia has taken the lead in efforts to stake a claim, planting a titanium flag on the North Pole seabed and sending air patrols close to Canadian airspace - belligerent moves that have forced Ottawa to scramble jets.
Foreign policy watchers say Ottawa is right to be concerned about the outcome of this 21st-century gold rush, especially given the recent Russian aggression in Georgia.
"What Georgia shows is that uncertain boundaries and oil and gas and Russians are a volatile mix," said Rob Huebert, associate director of the University of Calgary's Centre for Military and Strategic Studies.
"If nothing else, this should be a wake-up call for us and we should not expect this to be a cakewalk with the Russians. They are very aggressive in pursuing what they believe are their interests."
Canada has responded in recent years by mounting increasingly large military exercises in the Arctic - one just wrapped up yesterday - but the fleet of Arctic-offshore patrol ships it's building to defend its northern coast won't be ready until at least 2013.
One of Mr. Harper's aides described his northern tour as "a bit of a vision thing" aimed at presenting him as a forward-thinking leader planning for Canada's future - and trying to create a contrast with Liberal Leader Stéphane Dion, whom they painted as hapless and naive on Arctic policy.
At a recent press briefing, a senior Conservative mocked Mr. Dion's strategy, suggesting it was limited to creating more national parks. "National Parks don't chase down ships that don't stop," he said. "You need to actually have boots on the ground, and boats in the water. You need to have surveillance."
Strategic Counsel pollster Peter Donolo said Mr. Harper's focus on Arctic sovereignty might help the Conservatives with swing voters. "It's a useful issue because of the suspicion of him being too pro-American and not enough of a champion of Canada," Mr. Donolo said.
