Last updated at 09:24 29 June 2007

Russian President Vladimir Putin is making an astonishing bid to grab a vast chunk of the Arctic - so he can tap its vast potential oil, gas and mineral wealth.

His scientists claim an underwater ridge near the North Pole is really part of Russia's continental shelf.

One newspaper printed a map of the "new addition", a triangle five times the size of Britain with twice as much oil as Saudi Arabia.

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The dramatic move provoked an international outcry. The U.S. and Canada expressed shock and environment campaigners said it would be a disaster.

Observers say the move is typical of Putin's muscle-flexing as he tries to increase Russian power.

Under current international law, the countries ringing the Arctic - -Russia, Canada, the U.S., Norway, and Denmark (which owns Greenland) - are limited to a 200-mile economic zone around their coasts.

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A UN convention says none can claim jurisdiction over the Arctic seabed because the geological structure does not match the surrounding continental shelves.

But Russian scientists have returned from a six-week mission on a nuclear ice-breaker to claim that the 1,220-mile long underwater Lomonosov Ridge is geologically linked to the Siberian continental platform - and similar in structure.

The region is currently administered by the International Seabed Authority but this is now being challenged by Moscow.

Experts estimate the ridge has ten billion tons of gas and oil deposits and significant sources of diamonds, gold, tin, manganese, nickel, lead and platinum.

A Russian attempt to claim Arctic territory was rejected five years ago, but this time Moscow plans to make a far more serious submission to the UN Commission on the Limits of the Continental Shelf. A British diplomatic source warned

that Russia was planning to secure its grip on oil and gas supplies "for decades to come".

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He said: "Putin wants a strong Russia, and Western dependence on it for oil and gas supplies is a key part of his strategy. He no longer cares if it upsets the West."

The U.S. state department said the Russian claim was completely unacceptable. "It's an extraordinary idea and I can't believe it will go anywhere," an official said.

A Canadian official called the move a complete surprise.

Green groups warned that the Kremlin claim could devastate one of the world's last unspoilt areas.

John Sauven, director of Greenpeace UK, said: "We think nations should stop searching for new sources of fossil fuel and focus instead on the alternatives - renewables, energy efficiency and decentralised energy systems.

"Only then will disputes over natural resources become a thing of the past."

Ted Nield, of the Geological Society in London, branded Russia's claim nonsensical.

"The notion that geological structures can somehow dictate ownership is deeply peculiar," he said.

"Anyway, the Lomonosov Ridge is not part of a continental shelf - it is the point at which two ocean floor plates under the Arctic Ocean are spreading apart.

"It extends from Russia across to Canada, which means Canada could use the same argument and say the ridge is part of the Canadian shelf.

"If you take that to its logical conclusion, Canada could claim Russia and the whole of Eurasia as its own."