470 



Mr. Everett. Under the legislation you could control the dumping 

 by a foreign-flag vessel that i)icks up material in a U.S. port, as far as 

 a hundred miles oil the coast of the United States. That is what I have 

 been led to believe. And I was wondering if this statement you have 

 at the top of page 4 covers that ? 



Mr. Stevenson. Well, it was intended to cover that. 



Mr. E^'erett. So, actually, you can control the removal as well as the 

 dmnping, if it is picked up at a U.S. port — even though it is a foreign- 

 flag vessel. 



Mr. Stevenson. Yes. 



When you are talking about the question of transporting material 

 from the United States for the purpose of dmnping it, we could 

 regulate that — it wouldn't matter where they were intending to dump, 

 in terms of the regulation that we imposed, in terms of not letting them 

 do it or acceptmg whatever conditions we were talking about — but 

 that does not mean that we would have enforcement jurisdiction, or 

 could, on the basis of this, set forth some sort of a general code regulat- 

 ing dumping beyond our jurisdiction. What we are regulating is the 

 removal of the materials from our shores for the purpose of dumping. 



Mr. Everett. Now with respect to these international conventions 

 you mentioned, they are only binding as to those nations that are 

 signatory to the Convention. Is that correct ? 



Mr. Stevenson. In all cases we would only be talking about coun- 

 tries that became parties to the Convention. 



Mr. Everett. Now, with respect to the Continental Shelf Conven- 

 tion, you indicated in the statement that, normally, controls over the 

 exercise of jurisdiction over the resources of the Continental Shelf were 

 prunarily for the purpose of exploitability, I believe, and exploration. 

 One of the bills before us today has a provision that would try to 

 control the dmnping of materials out to the 200-meter depth contour by 

 foreign-flag vessels irrespective of whether the material was received 

 on board the vessel at a U.S. port or foreign port. 



Do you think a coastal nation has the right to protect its resources 

 of the Continental Shelf from pollution as it has in its 3- to 9-mile 

 zone ? 



Mr, Stevenson. Well, the Continental Shelf Convention does not 

 deal with the question of dumpmg. It deals with the coastal states' 

 rights to explore and exploit the Continental Shelf's resources. The 

 clear intention of the Geneva Conventions is to make dumping beyond 

 the territorial sea and the contiguous zone governed by the High Seas 

 Convention. Therefore, the rules for the area beyond the territorial sea 

 and contiguous zone are based on the liigh-seas conception of regulat- 

 mg our own flag vessels, or reaching international agreement as to 

 the appropriate regulatory rules. There is no right on the basis of 

 your jurisdiction over the Continental Shelf to regulate what happens 

 on the seas above with respect to dumping. 



Now, this does not mean that you have no rights. Even under exist- 

 ing law, in the absence of international agreement with respect to 

 dumping, the high-seas regime requires that you exercise the freedoms 



