Hans Island (Greenlandic/Inuktitut: Tartupaluk; Danish: Hans Ø; French: Île Hans) is a small, uninhabited barren knoll measuring 1.3 km² (0.5 sq mi), located at approximately 80°49′41″N, 66°27′35″W in the centre of the Kennedy Channel of Nares Strait—the strait that separates Ellesmere Island from northern Greenland and connects Baffin Bay with the Lincoln Sea. Hans Island is the smallest of three islands located in Kennedy Channel; the others are Franklin Island and Crozier Island.

The island is claimed by both Canada and Denmark. The dispute over Hans Island may turn into a test case on territorial claims in the Arctic (particularly regarding the contested Northwest Passage south of the island), a region that could become more important if Arctic shrinkage opens it up to more human activity.

In 1984 Kenn Harper, a historian from Iqaluit, Nunavut, wrote an article about Hans Island which was published in the local newspaper Hainang, in Qaanaaq (Thule) in northwestern Greenland. This article was picked up by a Danish newspaper in Copenhagen, and by CBC Radio in Canada, which gave Hans Island its first fleeting publicity.

This article was sparked because of a chance encounter on the ice near Resolute, Nunavut, in the Canadian Arctic in the autumn of 1983. According to Kenn Harper he met a man wearing a hat with bold letters around the side of the hat saying "HANS ISLAND, N.W.T.". This man was a scientist with Dome Petroleum who had just spent the summer on the island doing ice research. Dome Petroleum did research on and around the island from 1980 to 1983.

Oil companies build artificial islands in the sea on which to position their drilling rigs. Hans Island was apparently the perfect setting to test such artificial islands' strength to withstand the force of being hit by large floes of multi-year ice.

Simultaneously, the Danish and Canadian governments were in the process of signing a cooperation agreement in relation to the marine environment in Nares Strait. The agreement was signed and put into force on August 26, 1983. (The treaty was extended even further in 1991.)

One of the items also discussed was the possibility of establishing a reciprocal arrangement for processing applications to conduct research on and around Hans Island. This was never signed; however, Canadian John Munro, at that time Minister for Northern Affairs and Development, and Danish Tom Høyem, at that time Minister for Greenland, agreed, in common interest, to avoid acts that might prejudice future negotiations.

However, unknown to the politicians, Dome Petroleum was already doing research on the island. According to Kenn Harper, the Canadian Department of External Affairs conducting these negotiations with the Danes might not even have been aware that Dome Petroleum was already doing research on the island. Kenn Harper claims that in 1984 a senior official of Energy Mines and Resources, Canada, wrote him, saying, "To my knowledge the Department of Energy, Mines & Resources did not confer with the Department of External Affairs over the use of the island by Dome Petroleum."

When Kenn Harper’s article of 1984, mentioning Dome Petroleum and Hans Island, found its way to the Danish newspapers, it is not difficult to see why Tom Høyem in 1984 chartered a helicopter from Greenland and went to Hans Island. It might indeed have been something so simple as a misunderstanding and breach in communications.

It is said that Tom Høyem planted the Danish flag on the Island and left a little message saying "Velkommen til den danske ø" (English: Welcome to the Danish Island). It is also said he left a bottle of cognac

2004 to present
The dispute suddenly came to popular attention through Canadian press stories during late March 2004. Within days, it spread to other newspapers worldwide. Shortly after, Internet newsgroups, weblogs and forums began to start new threads and entries on the subject. Satirical headlines like "Canada being invaded" and "Denmark massing troops on Canadian territory" were typical.

The issue came to light on March 25, 2004, when Adrian Humphreys of the Canadian National Post newspaper wrote an article entitled "Five-year plan to 'put footprints in the snow' and assert northern sovereignty". Humphreys made a brief mention of the dispute over Hans Island, and that the Danes had sent warships to the island.

While Canada wanted to assert sovereignty of its northern territories for a variety of reasons unrelated to this dispute, Hans Island soon became the focus of the debate, and was presented as the main reason for this new Canadian policy.

The Arctic sea region has long been a subject of dispute. In this matter, Canada, Denmark, Russia and Norway all share a common interest because they regard parts of the Arctic seas as "national waters". The United States and most European Union countries, on the other hand, officially regard the region as international waters.

Hans Island, 3 May 2004, by Kelly Falkner, Canadian Archipelago Throughflow Study.Further items in the Canadian media led to the issue being picked up by international news organizations.

The Canadian federal government's 2004 budget was introduced on March 23, 2004, two days before the issue gained widespread attention. It proposed minimal increases to spending on national defence. The issue of Hans Island was raised in the Canadian Parliament by opposition foreign affairs critic Stockwell Day to highlight the government's failure to provide more funding for the military.

A new article by Adrian Humphreys on March 30, 2004, also in the National Post, entitled "Danes summon envoy over Arctic fight — the solution of the dispute is not going to be military", drew even more attention to the issue. The article claimed that Brian Herman, Canada’s only diplomat in Denmark (ambassador Alfonso Gagliano having been recently recalled as a result of an unrelated Canadian scandal), was called before the Danish Ministry of Foreign Affairs, to comment about his country's intentions in the dispute, which had, according to the article, recently been inflamed by Danish sailors occupying Hans Island.

On March 31, 2004, the Danish and Canadian governments denied that Herman or any other Canadian official was summoned to the Danish Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Both governments stated that the dispute was a long-standing issue, and that nothing had changed in the matter.

The last time Danish seamen visited the island had been on August 1, 2003, but this information was not brought to the public's attention during the discussion. Comments posted on internet newsgroups and forums suggested that Danish seamen had just landed on the Island, despite the fact that this had occurred seven months before.

A Canadian military exercise, named "Narwhal 04", inflamed the issue further. Some saw this as a response to the Danish flag planting. However, this exercise had been in the planning stage since September 2003, and it took place around Pangnirtung, Baffin Island, 2,000 km (1,240 mi) south of Hans Island. The Canadian military denied that the exercise had anything to do with the Danish–Canadian territorial dispute. The exercise took place from August 9 to August 30, 2004, involving about 160 soldiers from the army, various aircraft, helicopters and one frigate, HMCS Montréal (FFH 336). About 600 Canadian Forces personnel were involved in total.

A new development came to light after Canadian Defence Minister Bill Graham visited the island on July 20, 2005. Peter Taksø-Jensen, the head of the International Law department at Denmark's foreign ministry, said the following in an interview with Reuters on July 25 in response to the event:

We consider Hans Island to be part of Danish territory and will therefore hand over a complaint about the Canadian minister's unannounced visit.

– Peter Taksø-Jensen, Danish Foreign Office

This is the first time a Danish government official has claimed that the island is solely Danish territory and is not in dispute. The Danish government has also said that it plans to return to Hans Island in the near future to re-erect its flag.

On August 18, 2005, Canadian frigate HMCS Fredericton (FFH 337) left Halifax for an Arctic cruise. Canadian officials said the month-long patrol was unrelated to the Hans Island dispute. The Kingston class patrol vessels HMCS Glace Bay and HMCS Shawinigan are also scheduled to patrol the Arctic this year.

In July 2007, owing to updated satellite imagery, Canadian authorities admitted that the island is not solely in Canadian territory, but recognized that the international border lies roughly in the middle of the island.

Google fight
"Google fight" or "Google war" is the name given to a number of advertisements on the internet search engine Google which promoted either Danish or Canadian sovereignty over Hans Island.

According to an article in the Ottawa Citizen on July 27, 2005, Toronto resident Rick Broadhead saw an ad on Google stating "Hans Island is Greenland. Greenland natives have used the island for centuries" and which linked to a Danish foreign affairs webpage that stated that Danish Ministry of Foreign Affairs had sent a note to Canada's ambassador to Denmark on July 25, 2005 expressing Denmark's regret that "the Canadian Minister of National Defence had paid a visit to Hans Island without prior notification of the Danish Government.” Poul Erik Dam Kristensen, Denmark's ambassador to Canada, told the press that the paid advertisement was not a Danish government initiative and whoever placed it was acting alone.

According to the article, this prompted Broadhead to put up his own ad on Google which linked to his own site, which promoted the Canadian claim to the island, on July 26.

Neither ad has been reported to have been seen on Google since July 29, 2005. A snapshot of Broadhead's advertising campaign is still visible on an Indian newspaper site

Hans Island Liberation Front

Why fight over such a remote piece or rock? This can be answered in one word - Oil. That's right, while both governments are officially committed to reducing energy usage in order to reduce carbon emissions, these same governments are dispatching warships (which burn oil and ad to carbons in the atmosphere) to this uninhabited piece of rock known as Hans Island. It is not that Hans Island itself has oil but, under current international laws of the sea, nations are entitled to claim territorial rights over the seas extending 200 miles off shore as well as the right to exclusive access to under sea resources extending an additional 150 miles beyond the 200 mile territorial limit (the 200 mile limit means that all of the nation's laws extend over this area and foreign ships cannot enter the area without permission - the additional 150 miles are open to ships sailing through but fishing and mining of undersea resources requires permission of the nation that owns the adjoining land).
 

 Global Warming is Changing Things
Until recently, ice has covered much of the land and water in the Arctic. This has made settlement and exploitation of mineral resources difficult, if not impossible. However, global warming is changing things. Melting ice in the Arctic opens the possibility of exploring for and exploiting the potentially vast mineral wealth of the area. Right now, oil is the mineral everyone is looking for.
Canada has always claimed that its northern territory extends over the entire area between Alaska and Greenland. Since the ice cap rendered the area practically useless for settlement and harvesting of resources, no one until now has challenged Canada's claims. However, with the ice starting to melt, Canada is being forced to either enforce its claims or risk losing control over the area, especially with regard to mineral wealth in the undersea portions of the area. As a result, the Canadian Defense Forces find themselves making frequent trips north to plant the flag and make their presence in the area known.

Which brings us to Hans Island which lies in the Kennedy Channel (named in mid-nineteenth century by the Arctic explorer Elisha Kane in honor of John Pendleton Kennedy, the U.S. Secretary of the Navy whose department funded Kane's expedition) which flows between Canada's Ellesmere Island and Greenland. The channel is part of one of the waterways that ultimately connects the Arctic Ocean with the Atlantic Ocean. The island itself was named after Hans Hendrik who appears to have been a native of Greenland who assisted as a guide on various British and American financed expeditions of the Arctic in the mid-nineteenth century. While included on area maps and visited by occasional Arctic explorers and Inuit (Eskimo) fishermen and hunters, Hans Island continued to remain an uninhabited piece of rock sitting in the middle of the nearly frozen sea until the late 20th century when interest in the Arctic began increasing.

Given the close proximity between the Canadian Arctic Islands and Greenland (which is a self-governing part of Denmark), Canada and Denmark felt it necessary to negotiate a border which was formalized in a treaty that took effect on March 13, 1974. During the negotiations Canadian negotiators indicated that they considered Hans Island to be a part of Canada. The Danes apparently disagreed and, rather than delay the border treaty, left the issue of control of Hans Island out of the treaty. A few years later, beginning in 1980, Canada's Dome Petroleum Company began doing some preliminary surveys around Hans Island and, when this was discovered by the Danes, interest in Hans Island began to heat up.

According to reports from the BBC, a contingent of Canadian troops visited the island in 1984 and stayed long enough to plant the Canadian flag and leave a bottle of Canadian whiskey at its base. A week later a Danish government official, Tom Hoeyem, made a trip to Hans Island where he replaced the Canadian flag, which apparently had been blown away by the Arctic wind, with the Danish flag and left a bottle of Aquavit (a Danish brandy) at its base.

A woman named Jennifer Beer, on behalf of the Hans Island Liberation Front has launched an on line petition urging Santa Claus to relocate his operation from the North Pole to Hans Island, the argument being that once global warming melts the Arctic ice cap his workshop will sink. As of this writing, thirty people have signed the petition (click here to see the petition - and sign if you wish). The website of the Canadian financial company, Efficient Market Canada, even has a tongue in cheek article touting Hans Island as an ideal retirement location for patriotic Canadians seeking to help Canada enforce its sovereignty by having permanent Canadian residents living on the island. Such a retirement location would be expensive, but Efficient Market Canada promises to educate those interested in retiring to Hans Island in investment strategies needed to build a retirement fund of sufficient size to be able to afford this.
 

Do something patriotic with your retirement: Retire on Hans Island!
Hans Island is a small uninhabited barren knoll located in the strait that separates Ellesmere Island from Northern Greenland. It's one of the most desolate places in Canada, and it's not really clear why anyone would ever want to live there, but then everyone's different. Canada's claim to sovereignty over Hans Island has recently been challenged, and given how difficult it would be to live on Hans Island, retiring there really would be a heroic act of patriotism.

Some people may find the icy desolation and utter isolation of a remote arctic island a refereshing break from the hustle and bustle of modern life. You'd be helping to defend Canada's sovereignty over this little bit of our nation, sovereignty that has recently been challenged by Denmark. Hans Island has been a part of Canada ever since it was claimed by Britain, pre-confederation; yet Denmark has sought to establish control over it in order to control the sea lanes, and to win potential fishing and mineral rights in the area.

If you do dream of retiring somewhere exotic, like Hans Island, you'll need to have saved up the required funds. For somehere like Hans that'll be a lot of money--you'll need specialized equipment, and an extensive support system, just to survive, not to mention bravery, an adventurous spirit, and some considerable luck.

Efficient Market Canada will educate you about the Canadian investment industry, teach you about Canadian mutual funds and exchange traded funds, provide investment book reviews and ultimately help you build a self-directed RRSP efficiently, for the lowest cost. With sound financial planning you should be able to save up enough to fulfill your retirement dreams, even if you dream of something as crazy as living on Hans Island.

So far the Canadian government has not responded, they’re probably still looking for Google in the dictionary, or quickly renaming all the Tim Horton’s Danishes to Hans Islands… Classic Canadian response to a dispute.