According to a recent report by the United Nations Environment Programme, reducing black carbon and ozone in the lower part of the atmosphere, especially in the Arctic countries of America, Canada, Russia and Scandinavia, could cut warming in the Arctic by two-thirds over the next three decades.
Ms. Aglukkaq, who was raised in the Arctic, said Canada will resist the EU's bid until "a satisfactory agreement" has been reached.
Since 2008, Mike has taken the Young Explorers on nine expeditions which included notable stops in Monaco, the Arctic and Nunavut Canada, New Zealand, Antarctica, Mongolia, South Africa and Borneo.
FORBES: The Real Deal... Mike Horn Takes Young Explorers to the Far Corners of the Planet
The council is the main intergovernmental forum for the five countries on the Arctic Ocean America, Canada, Denmark, Norway and Russia and three others in the Arctic Circle (Finland, Iceland and Sweden).
In the early 1990s geologists working for companies not allied with De Beers discovered a great trove of diamonds just below the Arctic Circle in northwestern Canada.
Chemical effects related to acidification have also been encountered in surface waters of the Bering Strait and the Canada Basin of the central Arctic Ocean.
At the moment, this route through the Canadian archipelago is navigable at best for a brief summer spell. (Sovereignty over the passage is one of the Arctic's many unresolved issues: Canada claims it, but the United States says the waters are international.) In theory, a complete opening of the Northwest Passage can shave 2, 500 miles off a journey from Europe to Asia.
Russia, the United States, Denmark, Greenland, Canada and Norway, which border the Arctic, and China are also scrambling to control the region and access to the commercial ventures there.
Russia and Canada, the two biggest Arctic countries by area, have encouraged this fear: the Arctic stirs fierce nationalist sentiment in both.
The Arctic's importance has gained extra strategic and economic significance as melting ice in the polar region strengthens the feasibility of nations to use the Northern Sea Route (NSR) across the top of Russia and the Northwest Passage through Canada's Arctic archipelago.
The idea is to show solidarity with hunters, on Canada's Atlantic and Arctic coasts, who are enraged at the European Union's recent ban on imports of seal products.
The new observatory will "support longer-term, science-based understanding of the dramatic changes taking place in Arctic waters, " said Kim Juniper, with NEPTUNE Canada, in a statement from the University of Victoria.
But federal transfers are likely to decline, when the neighbouring Northwest Territories is divided in 1999 and the new Nunavut administration in Canada's eastern Arctic requires start-up funds.
Under international law five countries lying partly in the Arctic Circle Russia, the United States, Canada, Norway and Denmark are limited to a 200 mile (320km) economic zone from their shores.
By August 9, 1923 the situation had become desperate, prompting the Chicago Tribune to declare "Scientists Say Arctic Ice Will Wipe Out Canada".
The Arctic Council, made up of the United States, Russia, Canada and the five Nordic nations -- Norway, Sweden, Finland, Denmark and Iceland -- was set up in 1996 to coordinate policy in a resource-rich but environmentally sensitive part of the world.
Icelanders are also keen to co-operate with Russia, Canada, and Norway in the Barents Sea and in the Arctic region.
Many climate scientists say their biggest fear is that warming could melt the Arctic permafrost which stretches for thousands of miles across Alaska, Canada, and Siberia.
They have teamed up with other Arctic dwellers such as the Sami of Scandinavia and the Dene of north-western Canada.
The Arctic is already a big source of minerals, including zinc in Alaska, gold in Canada, iron in Sweden and nickel in Russia, and there is plenty more to mine.
Canada and Russia also hope to develop their Arctic shipping-lanes, which the melt is making accessible.
Canada, which displays distinctive robustness on Arctic issues, is not minded to admit the EU, which tiresomely bemoans the annual seal slaughter.
The Arctic remains one of the few unexplored regions of the world and the region above Alaska and western Canada is believed to be oil rich.
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