9 Junes 2025
French President Emmanuel Macron opened the UN Ocean Conference in Nice on Monday with an urgent call for multilateral action to save the seas.
“The first answer is multilateralism,” said Macron. “The deep sea is not for sale, neither is Greenland for sale, nor Antarctica,” he added in a veiled response to US President Donald Trump‘s expansionist statements since he took office in January.
“While the Earth is warming, the ocean is boiling,” said the French president, as he called for an “open partnership” in science and research to protect the world’s oceans.
“The climate, like biodiversity, is not a matter of opinion; it’s a matter of scientifically established facts,” he added.
A High Seas Treaty will be ratified by a sufficient number of countries at the summit to enter into force, Macron confirmed, noting that 50 countries had submitted ratifications “in the past few hours” before the UN Ocean Conference officially opened.
“In addition to the 50 ratifications already submitted here in the last few hours, 15 countries have formally committed to joining them,” said Macron. “This means that the political agreement has been reached, which allows us to say that this High Seas Treaty will be properly implemented. So it’s a done deal,” he added, without specifying a timeline.
The treaty, signed in 2023, will enter into force 120 days after the 60th ratification. France initially wanted to obtain the 60 ratifications before the Nice conference began.
Around 60 heads of state and government are attending the third UN Ocean Conference, including Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva and his Argentine counterpart Javier Milei.
Moratorium on deep-sea mining ‘a necessity’
Macron also called for a moratorium on deep-sea mining, which was “a necessity”, he maintained.
“I think it’s madness to launch predatory economic action that will disrupt the deep seabed, disrupt biodiversity, destroy it … The moratorium on deep seabed exploitation is an international necessity,” he told the gathering in Nice, southeastern France.
Trump has brought urgency to the debate around deep-sea mining, moving to fast-track US exploration in international waters and sidestepping global efforts to regulate the nascent sector.
