This is the seventeenth volume in the Brill/Nijhoff series on International Straits of the World. As the Series Editor I am very pleased to add to the series The Estonian Straits: Exceptions to the Strait Regime of Innocent or Transit Passage by Dr. Alexander Lott. This volume is a revised version of his doctoral thesis completed at the University of Tartu.
The regime of straits used in international navigation was one of the core topics during the nine-year long negotiation of the 1982 United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea. The Convention created new categories of straits together with new regimes of passage. More than thirty-five years after the Convention was adopted the regime of straits under international law continues to stir lively scholarly discussion. This latest scholarly addition to the international literature on straits is a testament to the complexity and continued relevancy of this issue to law of the sea studies.
In this seminal work on the Estonian Straits Dr. Lott skilfully examines the evolution and practice of the international regime of straits used in international navigation. The book first presents the reader with a clear, detailed and critical doctrinal overview of the regime of straits under international law by leading scholars. Dr. Lott provides thoughtful and innovative perspectives on the criteria for the different categorization of straits, and their respective regimes of passage, distinguishing between liberal and restrictive approaches.
This book also contributes to the existing scholarship on maritime boundaries. Dr. Lott examines straits, and their regimes of passage, from the lens of maritime boundaries focusing on maritime boundary delimitation in the Gulf of Riga and Gulf of Finland. He posits that as man-made determinants states can use boundaries to determine the categorization of certain straits under UNCLOS and the applicable regime, providing the Estonian Straits as a case study. Dr. Lott brings the rich history of the region spanning the period during the period of the former Soviet Union and after its dissolution and sheds light on the legal history of the Gulf of Riga and Gulf of Finland examining various international treaties and their interpretation by domestic courts.
This book will no doubt take its place as the seminal work on the Estonian Straits as well as an important addition to the rich scholarship of the law of the sea.
Nilufer Oral
Istanbul, 2018