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Canadian company asks U.S. for deep-sea mining permit, bypassing UN agency TenX News
A Canadian company announced Tuesday that its U.S. subsidiary submitted applications to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration to mine the seafloor, sparking outrage by bypassing a U.N. agency that regulates deep international waters.
The Metals Company, based in Vancouver, said it was seeking two exploration licenses and a commercial recovery permit, marking the first time a company applies to commercially mine the seabed.
The filing is expected to spark a complex legal battle since the Jamaica-based International Seabed Authority, a U.N. agency that regulates international deep-sea waters, has the power to authorize exploitation permits.
“Any commercial exploitation outside of national jurisdiction carried out without the authorization of ISA would constitute a violation of international law,” the authority said in late March after
The Metals Company announced its intention to seek permission from the U.S. government to start deep-sea mining in international waters.
There are currently no regulations in place to oversee such mining as scientists warn that extracting minerals from vital ecosystems that help regulate climate change could cause permanent damage.
Filing follows Trump directive
The filing comes less than a week after U.S. President Donald Trump issued an executive order that directs the Secretary of Commerce to expedite the review and issuance of exploration and commercial recovery permits, among other things.
“With these applications, we are offering the United States a shovel-ready path to new and abundant supplies of nickel, copper, cobalt, and manganese — critical metals for energy, infrastructure and defense,” Gerard Barron, chairman and CEO of The Metals Company, said in a statement.
Environmentalists and activists decried the move, saying that ISA has the sole power to authorize exploitation permits.
“This unilateral American effort to carve up the Pacific Ocean already faces fierce international opposition,” said Ruth Ramos, Greenpeace’s international senior campaigner. “Governments around the world must now step up to defend international rules and cooperation against rogue deep-sea mining.”
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For years, members of the authority’s council have debated how and if to allow deep-sea mining. So far, the authority has only issued exploration licenses, with most of the current exploratory activity concentrated in the Clarion-Clipperton Fracture Zone, which covers 1.7 million square miles (4.5 million square kilometers) between Hawaii and Mexico. At least 17 of 31 licenses have been issued for this zone, with exploration occurring at depths ranging from 13,000 to 19,000 feet (4,000 to 6,000 meters).
UN convention ratified by dozens of countries but not US
The International Seabed Authority was created in 1994 by the U.N. Convention on the Law of the Sea, which is ratified by more than 165 nations — but not the United States.
The Metals Company has argued that the U.S. seabed mining code would allow it to start operations in international waters, since it’s not a member of the authority and therefore not bound by its rules.
“After continuous delay at the international level, the United States now has a clear opportunity to reclaim its leadership role in the deep sea and set a global standard for responsible, science-based deep-seabed resource development,” Barron said.
U.S. mining code is no guarantee of a mining permit
But Emily Jeffers, senior attorney for the U.S.-based nonprofit Center for Biological Diversity, said it’s not a foregone conclusion that the company will be given permission to mine under the U.S. seabed mining code, which requires a full environmental analysis.
“This statute has been on the books for 45 years, and there’s a reason why no other companies have used it to extract minerals from the seafloor,” she said in a phone interview. “The science is clear that companies cannot satisfy the standard demanded by the statute. There’s no way to do deep-sea mining without having a significant and catastrophic effect on the environment.”
Jeffers said that if the Trump administration approves the permit, it would face legal challenges from environmental organizations.
‘Not an experiment we should be conducting’
In late March, the Vancouver-based company announced that it would seek permission from the U.S. to start deep-sea mining in international waters to extract minerals used in electric car batteries and other green technology.
The announcement was made just hours before the council of the ISA met on the last day of a two-week conference focused on how and whether to allow such mining. Scientists have said that a rush to collect minerals that take millions of years to form could unleash noise, light and smothering dust storms deep in the Earth’s oceans.
“Deep-sea mining has the potential to impact not just the seabed environment, but all of the life in between,” said Jeff Watters, external affairs vice president for the U.S.-based nonprofit Ocean Conservancy. “There are so many mysteries about this part of the ocean where we’ve just been able to scratch the surface.”
He said deep-sea mining is “not an experiment that we should be conducting.”
Watters said in a phone interview that the area The Metals Company is seeking to explore is larger than the size of South Dakota and the extraction area larger than the size of Vermont.
“The size and scale is just huge,” he said.
Companies say mining seafloor is cheaper, safer than land
Mining companies have said that harvesting minerals from the seafloor instead of from land is cheaper and has less of an environmental impact.
A spokesperson for the authority declined comment and referred to statements it made earlier this year.
The authority has said that it has the sole legal mandate to regulate mineral-related activities in the international seabed. It noted that the international legal regime established by the U.N. Convention on the Law of the Sea applies to all states, regardless of whether they are members or not.
“Any endeavor undertaken outside the recognized and consensual international framework, or in an attempt to circumvent international law, may incur legal, diplomatic, economic, security, financial and reputational risks,” the authority said.
Prime Minister Mark Carney’s trade mission to China is being framed as a win for British Columbia’s economy.
Carney announced a new deal with Beijing on electric vehicles and canola at the end of a high-profile trip on Friday.
“The inroads Canada has made this week are a sign that the government gets it and is showing Canadians and the world that we are open for business,” Alexa Young with the Vancouver Fraser Port Authority said.
The trade deal would allow up to 49,000 Chinese EVs into Canada yearly at a tariff rate of 6.1 per cent.
An expanded auto terminal on Annacis Island will be able to handle the additional volume of cars that could be more affordable than what is currently on the market, with prices expected to be under $40,000.
The New Car Dealers Association said in a statement to Global News that, “We look forward to reviewing the full details of this announcement and engaging constructively with governments to ensure that affordability, competition, and long-term market stability remain central considerations.”
In British Columbia, the overall reaction to the news on Friday is positive.
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“China’s economy is important,” Alex McMillan with the B.C. Chamber of Commerce said.
“Having trade deals like this — and diversifying our markets — is important. Providing certainty is important.”
There are concerns with the agreement, including privacy issues and China’s human rights record. But Ottawa’s goal is to double trade with partners outside the United States, which is a goal that would be impossible without China.
“We do want to see more trade and more diversification of our markets and know that China is an important nation and important economy, so having better trade relationships with them, I think overall is going to be good,” McMillan said.
–with files from The Canadian Press
© 2026 Global News, a division of Corus Entertainment Inc.
A Crown prosecutor says a Calgary man who willingly joined and worked for an Islamic State terrorist group in the Middle East over a decade ago should spend 16 years in prison, while a defence lawyer has recommended 12 years.
Jamal Borhot, 35, was convicted in December of three counts of participation in a terrorist group for assisting in the terrorist activities of ISIS in Syria in 2013.
Court heard Borhot and his cousin Hussein Borhot illegally entered Syria through Turkey.
Hussein Borhot pleaded guilty in a separate trial and was sentenced in 2022 to 12 years.
In December, Justice Corina Dario found Jamal Borhot participated in violent acts, actively recruited others to join the cause and worked in administration.
He returned to Calgary after one year.
Jamal Borhot travelled to Syria in 2013 with his cousin Hussein Borhot, seen here outside the Calgary Court Centre, after pleading guilty in a separate trial in 2022.
Global News
The judge is scheduled to sentence Borhot on Feb. 4.
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At a sentencing hearing Friday, prosecutor Kent Brown said 16 years is appropriate for Jamal Borhot, as the cousin received less time for his pleas.
“The focus remains deterrence and denunciation and that is largely due to the pernicious nature of terrorism offences. Anyone who engages in those activities should expect a significant sentence as a result,” Brown said.
Borhot planned the trip to Syria and tried to hide his movements, the prosecutor said.
“There was real risk of serious harm caused by the offender’s conduct. I submit that’s without question here, given his involvement in battles in Syria.”
Brown added outside court that the case was difficult to prosecute since it happened so long ago. “It’s a cold case that happened in a country half way around the world.”
Defence lawyer Pawel Milczarek said his client has lived a peaceful life since returning to Canada and should have a sentence that’s proportionate to his cousin’s prison time.
Milczarek said Borhot became radicalized and wanted to help fight the Syrian government, as he believed it was randomly slaughtering civilians.
“Mr. Borhot was motivated by this purpose to travel to Syria. He found the wrong group to fight with,” the lawyer said.
“With 20/20 hindsight, we can all identify that ISIS became a violent terrorist organization after Mr. Borhot left Syria. We should not harshly punish Mr. Borhot for making a mistake with imperfect information.”
Borhot did not address the court.
© 2026 The Canadian Press
As Iran returned to uneasy calm after a wave of protests that drew a bloody crackdown, a senior hard-line cleric called Friday for the death penalty for detained demonstrators and directly threatened U.S. President Donald Trump — evidence of the rage gripping authorities in the Islamic Republic.
Trump, though, struck a conciliatory note, thanking Iran’s leaders for not executing hundreds of detained protesters, in a further sign he may be backing away from a military strike. Executions, as well as the killing of peaceful protesters, are two of the red lines laid down by Trump for possible action against Iran.
Harsh repression that has left several thousand people dead appears to have succeeded in stifling demonstrations that began Dec. 28 over Iran’s ailing economy and morphed into protests directly challenging the country’s theocracy.
There have been no signs of protests for days in Tehran, where shopping and street life have returned to outward normality, though a week-old internet blackout continued. Authorities have not reported any unrest elsewhere in the country.
“Iran canceled the hanging of over 800 people,” Trump told reporters in Washington, adding that “I greatly respect the fact that they canceled.”
Trump did not clarify who he spoke to in Iran to confirm the state of any planned executions.
The U.S.-based Human Rights Activists News Agency on Friday put the death toll at 3,090. The number, which exceeds that of any other round of protest or unrest in Iran in decades and recalls the chaos surrounding the 1979 revolution, continues to rise.
The agency has been accurate throughout the years of demonstrations, relying on a network of activists inside Iran that confirms all reported fatalities.
The AP has been unable to independently confirm the toll. Iran’s government has not provided casualty figures.
Hard-line cleric’s fiery sermon
In contrast, the sermon by Ayatollah Ahmad Khatami carried by Iranian state radio sparked chants from those gathered for prayers, including: “Armed hypocrites should be put to death!”
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Khatami, a member of Iran’s Assembly of Experts and Guardian Council long known for his hard-line views, described the protesters as the “butlers” of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and “Trump’s soldiers.” He said Netanyahu and Trump should await “hard revenge from the system.”
“Americans and Zionists should not expect peace,” the cleric said.
FILE – Iranian senior cleric Ahmad Khatami delivers his sermon during Friday prayer ceremony in Tehran, Iran, Friday, Jan. 5, 2018. (AP Photo/Ebrahim Noroozi, File).
EN
His fiery speech came as allies of Iran and the United States alike sought to defuse tensions. Russian President Vladimir Putin spoke Friday to both Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian and Israel’s Netanyahu, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said.
Russia had previously kept largely quiet about the protests. Moscow has watched several key allies suffer blows as its resources and focus are consumed by its 4-year-old war against Ukraine, including the downfall of Syria’s former President Bashar Assad in 2024, last year’s U.S. and Israeli attacks on Iran and the U.S. seizure of Venezuelan leader Nicolas Maduro this month.
Exiled Iranian royal calls for fight to continue
Days after Trump pledged “help is on its way” for the protesters, both the demonstrations and the prospect of imminent U.S. retaliation appeared to have receded. One diplomat told The Associated Press that top officials from Egypt, Oman, Saudi Arabia and Qatar had raised concerns with Trump that a U.S. military intervention would shake the global economy and destabilize an already volatile region.
Iran’s exiled Crown Prince Reza Pahlavi urged the U.S. to make good on its pledge to intervene. Pahlavi, whose father was overthrown by Iran’s 1979 Islamic Revolution, said he still believes the president’s promise of assistance.
“I believe the president is a man of his word,” Pahlavi told reporters in Washington. He added that “regardless of whether action is taken or not, we as Iranians have no choice to carry on the fight.“
“I will return to Iran,” he vowed. Hours later, he urged protesters to take to the streets again from Saturday to Monday.
Despite support by diehard monarchists in the diaspora, Pahlavi has struggled to gain wider appeal within Iran. But that has not stopped him from presenting himself as the transitional leader of Iran if the regime were to fall.
Iran authorities list protest damage
Khatami, the hard-line cleric, also provided the first overall statistics on damage from the protests, claiming 350 mosques, 126 prayer halls and 20 other holy places had sustained damage. Another 80 homes of Friday prayer leaders — an important position within Iran’s theocracy — were also damaged, likely underlining the anger demonstrators felt toward symbols of the government.
He said 400 hospitals, 106 ambulances, 71 fire department vehicles, and another 50 emergency vehicles also sustained damage.
Even as protests appeared to have been smothered inside Iran, thousands of exiled Iranians and their supporters have taken to the streets in cities across Europe to shout out their rage at the government of the Islamic Republic.
Amid the continuing internet shutdown, some Iranians crossed borders to communicate with the outside world. At a border crossing in Turkey’s eastern province of Van, a trickle of Iranians crossing on Friday said they were traveling to get around the communications blackout.
“I will go back to Iran after they open the internet,” said a traveler who gave only his first name, Mehdi, out of security concerns.
Also crossing the border were some Turkish citizens escaping the unrest in Iran.
Mehmet Önder, 47, was in Tehran for his textiles business when the protests erupted. He said he laid low in his hotel until it was shut for security reasons, then stayed with one of his customers until he was able to return to Turkey.
Although he did not venture into the streets, Önder said he heard heavy gunfire.
“I understand guns, because I served in the military in the southeast of Turkey,” he said. “The guns they were firing were not simple weapons. They were machine-guns.”
In a sign of the conflict’s potential to spill over borders, a Kurdish separatist group in Iraq said it has launched attacks on Iran’s paramilitary Revolutionary Guard in recent days in retaliation for Tehran’s crackdown on protests.
A representative of the Kurdistan Freedom Party, or PAK, said its members have “played a role in the protests through both financial support and armed operations to defend protesters when needed.” The group said the attacks were launched by members of its military wing based inside Iran.
Amiri reported from New York. Associated Press journalists Will Weissert and Darlene Superville in Washington and Serra Yedikardes at the Kapikoy Border Crossing, Turkey, contributed.
Canada-China trade deal framed as a win for B.C.’s economy TenX News
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