The Race to the Poles

This past Thursday, Canada and Russia tried to work out claims over the Arctic as each country looked to its energy riches and new shipping routes made increasingly possible by the melting Polar ice. 
Along with Canada and Russia, Norway, Denmark, and the United States are all at odds over how to divide up the Arctic seabed. Why? According to the US Geological Survey, the Arctic is thought to hold 90 billion barrels of oil and 30 percent of the world's untapped gas resources.
Every winter, the Arctic ice shelf returns less and less making the seabed more accessible.
In an effort to solidify the idea that the North Pole has been claimed since 2007 (Here: Quest for the Poles), Russia will boost its research efforts next month by launching a drifting research station. Russia must have scientific data of such energy sources, prove that the people of Russia need said energy and submit them to the United Nations in 2013 (matching the claim made by Canada expected for that year.)
The two Arctic nations claim the Lomonosov Ridge, a mountain chain running underneath the Arctic, as an extension of their continental shelf. AP

The Quest for The Poles

The North Pole is dealing with more conflict and drama then the Spederline custody battle.

.First and last time time I will drop that name, promise.

It seems that the World is beginning a race to stake claims at the North Pole's natural resources since the United States' maritime strategy, A Cooperative Strategy for 21st Century Seapower, was proposed on October 17th.
So far Canada is planning on constructing a deep-water seaport and a military training center. Along with, the mapping of the seabed, patrolling the high latitudes by warplanes and combat aircraft and increasing the number of rangers at their northern bases. Denmark and Sweden joined hands to send the Swedish Arctic-class icebreaker, Oden, to the area north of Greenland on an expedition named LOMROG (Lomonosov Ridge off Greenland), the ridge over which the Arctic countries are fighting. And the U.S. Coast Guard icebreaker, Healy, led Germany's Polarstern and French Tara Schooner to the northern latitudes.

Looks like WW3 will be held in the frigid north and the United Kingdom won't be involved.
As mostly everyone else looks north, the British look to the south to the world's least explored continent, Antarctica. They are planning on claiming 386,000 sq miles of seabed where vast oil, gas and other mineral resources lay out of technical reach.
But what drove these countries to abruptly begin the quest for the poles? For that answer we look to Russia. Russia's expedition, in August, to plant a flag under the North Pole brought a new importance to the debate over the The 1959 Antarctic treaty. A treaty that up until now froze all territorial claims and the 1991 protocol to it prohibited the production of mineral resources in the Antarctic.

So far, every country has been acting within the guidelines of international law. But some of them now seem ready to rewrite it. Source.