Blue Ocean Law: Federal Deep-Sea Mining RFI Is Built on a False and Dangerous Premise—These Resources Are Not the United States’ to Exploit

HAGÅTÑA, GUAM / SAIPAN, CNMI — Blue Ocean Law, PC today sharply criticized the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management’s (BOEM) Request for Information (RFI) on commercial leasing for deep-sea minerals offshore the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands (CNMI), warning that the entire federal initiative rests on an erroneous assumption: that the United States has the right to unilaterally exploit marine resources that do not belong to it under international law.

“The mineral resources in and around the Mariana Islands are not the United States’ to unilaterally exploit,” said Blue Ocean Law. “They belong, under international law, to the peoples of Guam and the CNMI. Any federal process that presumes unilateral U.S. authority to extract them violates the right of self-determination and its most basic component: permanent sovereignty over natural resources.”

In formal comments submitted to BOEM, Blue Ocean Law explains that international law has long recognized that non-self-governing and dependent peoples retain inalienable rights to own, control, and dispose of their natural resources, including marine resources. The United Nations has repeatedly affirmed these principles in relation to Guam and its surrounding waters, emphasizing that administering powers may not exploit such resources for their own benefit or without regard for the genuine wishes and interests of the people concerned.

“You cannot run an ‘information-gathering’ process about how to mine resources when the threshold questions of ownership and rights have been repeatedly addressed by the United Nations and cannot be presumed in the federal government’s favor,” Blue Ocean Law said. “The RFI treats Chamorro and Refaluwasch peoples as stakeholders in what is, in fact, a matter of right and title.”

Beyond this core defect, the RFI is also scientifically reckless and legally deficient. Blue Ocean Law’s comment documents overwhelming scientific evidence that deep-sea mining would cause long-lasting, potentially irreversible harm to deep-sea ecosystems, disrupt carbon sequestration processes, and threaten fisheries, cultural practices, and food security in the Marianas. These harms would fall almost entirely on Indigenous communities, while economic benefits would flow outward to the federal government and private contractors, with no meaningful mechanism for local control, consent, or benefit-sharing.

The RFI also raises serious conflicts with domestic law, including the Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act, the Coastal Zone Management Act, and the National Environmental Policy Act, and is inconsistent with the United States’ obligations under international law to protect and preserve the marine environment and, consistent with the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, to respect the requirement of free, prior, and informed consent.

“This is resource colonialism dressed up as administrative process,” Blue Ocean Law said. “Asserting federal control over Indigenous marine resources without consent is unlawful under international law and fundamentally inconsistent with the United States’ professed commitment to a just and respectful Pacific partnership.”

Blue Ocean Law calls on BOEM to immediately suspend the RFI, adopt a precautionary moratorium on deep-sea mining in waters adjacent to Guam and the CNMI, and recognize that no discussion of exploitation can proceed unless and until the peoples of the Marianas are acknowledged as rights-holders with the authority to determine the future use of their marine resources.

About Blue Ocean Law

Blue Ocean Law is a Guam-based firm working across the Pacific to protect ocean ecosystems, uphold Indigenous rights, and advance environmental justice.