Recent technological advances have made us aware of the actual and the potential richness of the sea, not only for the provision of food, but also for the exploration and the exploitation of mineral and other resources.1 As far as oil, gas, and the minerals of the sea are concerned, the continental shelf and the deep seabed, beyond the limits of the continental shelf of individual coastal States, provide the main source. The deep seabed, in particular, is deemed to be bestrewn with polymetallic nodules, composed of manganese, copper, cobalt, and nickel.2 That such polymetallic nodules are of considerable economic interest to various countries, especially those of the industrialised nations of the western world, could hardly be denied. Indeed, plans for the exploration and the mining of such polymetallic nodules appear to have been drawn up and ready to be implemented in some of the western industrialised countries.

In view of its economic significance and worth, the deep seabed came to command a great deal of attention and discussion at the Third United Nations Conference on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS III), which began meeting in 1973. In August, 1980, UNCLOS III was able to produce an “Informal Text” of a Draft Convention on the Law of the Sea,3 under which a special international legal regime was proposed for the exploration and the exploitation of the deep seabed.4 But this latter feature of the Draft Convention came to be viewed by the newly-elected Reagan Administration