The issue would simply go away if AA said that they deem all Area I-III passages to be transpac regardless of the actual meridians crossed in flight.

IIRC some current polar routes (SIN-EWR etc) will route on the "Asian" or "European" side of the pole depending on winds.

The World According to the Airlines has already been carved up in strange ways (DXB is Europe? Really?) so this would not be that great a leap.

I wonder what motivated AA to make this judgement. North Atlantic traffic restrictions?

(FWIW a co-worker just returned from ORD-DEL-ORD and said the ORD-DEL leg was over central Greenland and northern Norway, while the return leg was a lot farther north but still on the Atlantic side of the pole.)