WASHINGTON (Sputnik) — Cooperation between the United States and Russia helped to establish the world’s largest marine protected area in Antarctica, US Secretary of State John Kerry said on Friday.
"We created the world’s largest marine protected area in the Antarctic Ross Sea, and I’m grateful to Russia," Kerry said during a conference in Rome. "We managed to come to compromise with Russia on that even as we have differences elsewhere and set aside the largest marine area anywhere in the world today."
On October 28, the United States, Russia and 22 other nations agreed to establish the Ross Sea Region Marine Protected Area during a Commission for the Conservation of Antarctic Marine Living Resources meeting in Australia.
The Ross Sea marine protected area in Antarctic's Southern Ocean added an additional 598,000 square miles to the existing 2.5 million square miles of protected ocean.
