Russia plants its flag on North Pole seabed

Russia planted its tri-colour national flag on the seabed more than 4km beneath the North Pole on Thursday,staking a symbolic claim to a vast swathe of Arctic territory believed to be rich in oil and minerals.A group of Russian explorers and scientists,carried in mini-submarines over 4,261 metres below the waves,became the first men to land on the sea bed of the North Pole
Artur Chilingarov,the Russian Arctic explorer masterminding the expedition, said,”It was a soft landing.The earth around is of a yellowish hue. There has been no sight of any living creatures in the sea depths”.A capsule containing a message for future generations was deposited beside the one-metre tall Russian flag fashioned out of titanium capable of resisting corrosion for two hundred years.By the time the rust sets in, much of the Arctic shelf,an area particularly vulnerable to global warming,may have melted,facilitating exploitation of potentially vast oil and gas reserves which Russia is eager to claim as its own.Explorers spent an hour gathering rock and sea water samples which will help researchers establish whether the area,known as the Lomonosov Ridge,is a geological extension of Russia’s continental shelf.Canada and Denmark also claim that the Lomonosov Ridge is linked to their territories...
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As in the days of Noah...