Two weeks of intense, marathon multilateral negotiations at the International Seabed Authority (ISA) headquarters in Kingston, Jamaica, have concluded without agreement on an exploitation code for deep-sea minerals.

The impasse leaves commercial extraction of polymetallic nodules in international waters effectively frozen. A growing coalition of nations—spanning Europe, Latin America, and the Pacific—firmly refused to approve draft regulations, arguing that scientific understanding of benthic ecosystems, hydrothermal vents, and oceanic carbon cycles remains dangerously incomplete.

Conversely, sponsoring states and commercial mining corporations argued that seabed nodules are essential to break terrestrial monopolies on battery metals needed for global electrification.

"We cannot rush into the industrial exploitation of the deep ocean before the science is clear and the legal framework is watertight."
— ISA Plenary Moratorium Coalition Statement

Legal Ambiguities of the Two-Year Rule

Delegates debated the legal status of the so-called 'two-year rule' under UNCLOS Part XI, with jurists reaffirming that in the absence of a finalized mining code, the ISA Council is not legally obligated to grant commercial exploitation contracts.