The Arctic consists of land, internal waters, territorial seas, exclusive economic zones (EEZs) and international waters above the Arctic Circle (66 degrees 33 minutes North latitude). All land, internal waters, territorial seas and EEZs in the Arctic are under the jurisdiction of one of the eight Arctic coastal states: Canada, Denmark (via Greenland), Finland, Iceland, Norway, Russia, Sweden and the United States. International law regulates this area as with other portions of Earth.

Under international law, the North Pole and the region of the Arctic Ocean surrounding it are not owned by any country. The sovereignty of the five surrounding Arctic countries is governed by three maritime zones as outlined in the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea:

1. Territorial Sea: This zone extends 12 nautical miles (22 km; 14 mi) from the baseline of a coastal state. Within this area, the state exercises full sovereignty over the airspace, waters, and seabed. However, there is an exception for the right of innocent passage, which allows foreign vessels to traverse through this zone.

2. Contiguous Zone: Extending 24 nautical miles from the baseline, this zone provides a state with limited rights to enforce certain laws and regulations pertaining to customs, fiscal matters, immigration, and sanitary control, as well as to uphold international law.

3. Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ): This zone extends up to 200 nautical miles (370 km; 230 mi) from the baseline. In the EEZ, the coastal state has the exclusive rights to explore and exploit natural resources found in the water column and on or under the seabed. Moreover, UNCLOS provides Arctic countries with special prerogatives. Art. 234 of the convention, the "Arctic exception" (also known as "the Canadian Clause") allows states to unilaterally apply special measures to protect the local environment and prevent vessel-source pollution when the territory in their EEZ is covered with ice for most of the year. However, the article requires scientific evidence to support the decision and states that these rules must not discriminate against foreign vessels.

The waters and sea bottom that is not confirmed to be extended continental shelf beyond the exclusive economic zones are considered to be the "heritage of all mankind". Fisheries in these waters can only be limited by international treaty. Exploitation of mineral resources on and below the seabed in these areas is administered by the UN International Seabed Authority.

Upon ratification of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS), a country has a ten-year period to make claims to an extended continental shelf which, if validated, gives it exclusive rights to resources on or below the seabed of that extended shelf area. Norway, Russia, Canada, and Denmark launched projects to provide a basis for seabed claims on extended continental shelves beyond their exclusive economic zones. The United States has signed, but not yet ratified the UNCLOS.

The status of certain portions of the Arctic sea region is in dispute for various reasons. Canada, Denmark, Norway, Russia, and the United States all regard parts of the Arctic seas as national waters (territorial waters out to ) or internal waters. There also are disputes regarding what passages constitute international seaways and rights to passage along them. There was one single disputed piece of land in the Arctic in the 21st century—Hans Island—which was disputed until 2022 (known as the Whisky War) between Canada and Denmark because of its location in the middle of a strait.

North Pole and the Arctic Ocean National sectors: 1925–2005 In 1925, based upon the sector principle, Canada became the first country to extend its maritime boundaries northward to the North Pole, at least on paper, between 60°W and 141°W longitude, a claim that is not universally recognized (there are of ocean between the Pole and Canada's northernmost land point).T. E. M. McKitterick, "The Validity of Territorial and Other Claims in Polar Regions", Journal of Comparative Legislation and International Law, 3rd Ser., Vol. 21, No. 1. (1939), pp. 89–97. On April 15 the following year, the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR declared the territory between two lines (32°04′35″E to 168°49′30″WSobranie Zakonov SSSR, 1926 (Russian)) drawn from west of Murmansk to the North Pole and from the eastern Chukchi Peninsula to the North Pole to be Soviet territory. Norway (5°E to 35°E) made similar sector claims, as did the United States (170°W to 141°W), but that sector contained only a few islands, so the claim was not pressed. Denmark's sovereignty over all of Greenland was recognized by the United States in 1916 and by an international court in 1933. Denmark could also conceivably claim an Arctic sector (60°W to 10°W).

In the context of the Cold War, Canada sent Inuit families to the far north in the High Arctic relocation, partly to establish territoriality. The Canadian monarch, Queen Elizabeth II, accompanied by the Duke of Edinburgh, Prince Charles, and Princess Anne, undertook in 1970 a tour of Northern Canada, in part to demonstrate to an unconvinced American government and the Soviet Union that Canada had certain claim to its Arctic territories, which were strategic during the Cold War. In addition, Canada claims the water within the Canadian Arctic Archipelago as its own internal waters. The United States is one of the countries which does not recognize Canada's, or any other countries', Arctic archipelagic water claims and has allegedly sent nuclear submarines under the ice near Canadian islands without requesting permission.

Until 1999, the geographic North Pole (a non-dimensional dot) and the major part of the Arctic Ocean had been generally considered to comprise international space, including both the waters and the sea bottom. However, the adoption of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) has prescribed a process which prompted several countries to submit claims or to reinforce pre-existing claims to portions of the seabed of the polar region.UN Convention on the Law of the Sea

Extended continental shelf claims: 2006–present

Overview As defined by the UNCLOS, states have ten years from the date of ratification to make claims to an extended continental shelf. They must present to the Commission on the Limits of the Continental Shelf, a UN body, geological evidence that their shelf effectively extends beyond the 200 nautical miles limit but no more than an additional 150 nautical miles or 100 nautical miles from the 2500-meter isobath, depending on which method the state chooses. The Commission does not define borders but merely judges the scientific validity of assertions and it is up to countries with rightful but overlapping claims to come to a settlement. On this basis, four of the five states fronting the Arctic Ocean – Canada, Denmark, Norway, and the Russian Federation – must have made any desired claims by 2013, 2014, 2006, and 2007 respectively. Since the U.S. has yet to ratify the UNCLOS, the date for its submission is undetermined at this time.

Claims to extended continental shelves, if deemed valid, give the claimant state exclusive rights to the sea bottom and resources below the bottom. Valid extended continental shelf claims do not and cannot extend a state's Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) since the EEZ is determined solely by drawing a line using territorial sea baselines as their starting point. Press reports often confuse the facts and assert that extended continental shelf claims expand a state's EEZ thereby giving a state exclusive rights to resources not only on the sea bottom or below it, but also to those in the water column above it. The Arctic chart prepared by Durham University explicitly illustrates the extent of the uncontested Exclusive Economic Zones of the five states bordering the Arctic Ocean, and also the relatively small expanse of remaining "high seas" or totally international waters at the very North of the planet.

Specific nations Canada

Canada ratified UNCLOS on 7 November 2003 and had through 2013 to file its claim to an extended continental shelf. , Canada had announced that it would file a claim which includes the North Pole. Canada planned to submit their claim to a portion of the Arctic continental shelf in 2018.

In response to the Russian Arktika 2007 expedition, Canada's Foreign Affairs Minister, Peter MacKay, said "[t]his is posturing. This is the true North, strong and free, and they're fooling themselves if they think dropping a flag on the ocean floor is going to change anything... This isn't the 14th or 15th century". In response, Sergey Lavrov, the Russian Minister of Foreign Affairs, stated "[w]hen pioneers reach a point hitherto unexplored by anybody, it is customary to leave flags there. Such was the case on the Moon, by the way... [W]e from the outset said that this expedition was part of the big work being carried out under the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea, within the international authority where Russia's claim to submerged ridges which we believe to be an extension of our shelf is being considered. We know that this has to be proved. The ground samples that were taken will serve the work to prepare that evidence".

On 25 September 2007, Prime Minister Stephen Harper said he was assured by Russian president Vladimir Putin that neither offence nor "violation of international understanding or any Canadian sovereignty" was intended. Harper promised to defend Canada's claimed sovereignty by building and operating up to eight Arctic patrol ships, a new army training centre in Resolute Bay, and the refurbishing of an existing deepwater port at a former mining site in Nanisivik.Michael McCormack, "More than Words: Securitization and Policymaking in the Canadian Arctic under Stephen Harper", American Review of Canadian Studies (2020) 50#4 pp 436-460.

Denmark

Denmark ratified UNCLOS on 16 November 2004 and had through 2014 to file a claim to an extended continental shelf.

The Kingdom of Denmark simultaneously declared that ratifying UNCLOS did not change Denmark's position that the Danish Straits including the Great Belt, the Little Belt, and the Danish part of Øresund, formed on the foundation of the Copenhagen Treaty of 1857 are legally Danish territory, and – as set out in the treaty section of the United Nations Office of Legal Affairs – this should remain so. Consequently, Denmark considers the Copenhagen Convention to apply solely to the waterways through Denmark proper and not the North Atlantic.

Greenland, an autonomous territory within the Kingdom of Denmark, has the nearest coastline to the North Pole, and Denmark argues that the Lomonosov Ridge is in fact an extension of Greenland. Danish project included LORITA-1 expedition in April–May 2006 and included tectonic research during LOMROG expedition, which were part of the 2007–2008 International Polar Year program. It comprised the Swedish icebreaker Oden and Russian nuclear icebreaker NS 50 Let Pobedy. The latter led the expedition through the ice fields to the research location. Further efforts at geological study in the region were carried out by the LOMROG II expedition, which took place in 2009, and the LOMROG III expedition, launched in 2012.