Deep-sea mining possibly as damaging as land mining, lawyers say

Environmental and legal groups warn of potential huge effects on Indigenous people and the environmento Sign up to receive the top stories in Australia every day at noon The "new global gold rush" over deep-sea mining holds the same potential pitfalls as previous resource scrambles, with environmental and social impacts ignored and the rights of Indigenous people marginalised, a paper in the Harvard Law Review has warned.A framework for deep-sea mining - where polymetallic nodules or hydrothermal vents are mined by machine - was first articulated in the 1960s, on an idea that the seabed floor beyond national jurisdiction was a "common heritage of mankind". Continue reading...