Norwegian Barents Secretariat

Last updated

The headquarters of the Norwegian Barents Secretariat in Kirkenes, Norway in August 2019
Photo: Kimberli Makarainen Barentssekretariatets hovedkontor.jpg
The headquarters of the Norwegian Barents Secretariat in Kirkenes, Norway in August 2019
Photo: Kimberli Mäkäräinen
The Barents Region. Barents-region.PNG
The Barents Region.

The Norwegian Barents Secretariat aims at developing the Norwegian-Russian relations in the north by promoting and funding Norwegian-Russian cooperation projects. As of 2022, the organisation has 11 employees in Kirkenes; its offices are in Arkhangelsk, Murmansk, the Nenets Region and Kirkenes. [1]

Contents

On behalf of the Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Secretariat grants funds to bilateral Norwegian-Russian cooperation projects. The Secretariat grants approximately 200 Norwegian-Russian projects annually.

The Secretariat is also a center of competence on Norwegian-Russian relations, by carrying through and finance various types of reviews or reports on relevant topics in the region. The Secretariat also coordinates the national goals with the regional political priorities within the frames of the multilateral Barents Cooperation, and work as a resource center for the councils, committees and working groups of the Barents Cooperation.

Head of the Norwegian Barents Secretariat is Lars Georg Fordal (in office since September 1, 2016).[ citation needed ]

The online newspaper The Barents Observer, which covers far northern news issues, with news stories from Russia, Norway, Sweden and Finland, published in English and Russian, was established in 2002 and operated under the aegis of the Barents Secretariat between 2005 and 2015. [2] [3] After a conflict between owners and editors, a new website was established in October 2015, owned by its editors. [4]

See also

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Nordic Council</span> Body for cooperation of Nordic countries

The Nordic Council is the official body for formal inter-parliamentary Nordic cooperation among the Nordic countries. Formed in 1952, it has 87 representatives from Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway, and Sweden as well as from the autonomous areas of the Faroe Islands, Greenland, and Åland. The representatives are members of parliament in their respective countries or areas and are elected by those parliaments. The Council holds ordinary sessions each year in October/November and usually one extra session per year with a specific theme. The council's official languages are Danish, Finnish, Icelandic, Norwegian, and Swedish, though it uses only the mutually intelligible Scandinavian languages—Danish, Norwegian, and Swedish—as its working languages. These three comprise the first language of around 80% of the region's population and are learned as a second or foreign language by the remaining 20%.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Barents Region</span> Place

The Barents Region is a name given, by advocates of establishing international cooperation after the fall of the Soviet Union, to the land along the coast of the Barents Sea, from Nordland in Norway to the Kola Peninsula in Russia and beyond all the way to the Ural Mountains and Novaya Zemlya, and south to the Gulf of Bothnia of the Baltic Sea and the great lakes Ladoga and Onega. Among the projects is the Barents Road from Bodø in Norway through Haparanda in Sweden and Finland to Murmansk in Russia. The region has six million inhabitants on 1.75 million km2; three quarters of both belong to Russia.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Kirkenes</span> Town in Northern Norway

Kirkenes is a town in Sør-Varanger Municipality in Finnmark county, in the far northeastern part of Norway. The town lies on a peninsula along the Bøkfjorden, an arm of the large Varangerfjorden, and is located just a few kilometres from the Norway-Russia border.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Arctic Council</span> Intergovernmental forum for the Arctic

The Arctic Council is a high-level intergovernmental forum that addresses issues faced by the Arctic governments and the indigenous people of the Arctic region. At present, eight countries exercise sovereignty over the lands within the Arctic Circle, and these constitute the member states of the council: Canada; Denmark; Finland; Iceland; Norway; Russia; Sweden; and the United States. Other countries or national groups can be admitted as observer states, while organizations representing the concerns of indigenous peoples can be admitted as indigenous permanent participants.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Saami Council</span> Non-governmental organization of the Saami people

The Saami Council is a voluntary, non-governmental organization of the Sámi people made up of nine Sámi member organizations from Finland, Norway, Russia, and Sweden. Since the founding of the Nordic Saami Council in 1956, among the first indigenous peoples' organizations, the Saami Council has actively dealt with Sámi public policy tasks. In 1992, when Russian Sámi groups joined the council, "Nordic" was removed from the council's name. The secretary was previously sited in both Helsinki and Utsjoki, Finland, but is now in Kárášjohka, Norway. The Saami Council is funded by a range of grants, and its engagements are based on decisions, statements, declarations, and political programs from the Saami Conference held every four years.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Norway–Russia relations</span> Bilateral relations

Norway–Russia relations are the bilateral foreign relations between the two countries, Norway and Russia. The establishment of diplomatic relationships between the two countries happened on October 30, 1905, four days after the establishment of Norway's independence. Russia has an embassy in Oslo and consulates in Barentsburg and Kirkenes, and Norway has an embassy in Moscow, and consulates in Murmansk and Saint Petersburg. The countries are neighboring each other along a 195.7 km long border. Norway is on Russia's Unfriendly Countries List.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Norway–Russia border</span> International border

The border between Norway and Russia consists of a 195.7-kilometer (121.6 mi) land border between Sør-Varanger Municipality, Norway, and Pechengsky District, Russia, and a 23.2-kilometer (14.4 mi) marine border in the Varangerfjord. It further consists of a border between the two countries' exclusive economic zones (EEZ) in the Barents Sea and the Arctic Ocean. Between 1944 and 1991 the border was between Norway and the Soviet Union. There is a single border crossing, on E105, located at Storskog in Norway and Borisoglebsky in Russia. The Norwegian side is patrolled by the Garrison of Sør-Varanger and is under the jurisdiction of the Norwegian Border Commissioner, while the Russian side is patrolled by the Border Guard Service of Russia. Two-thirds of the border follows two rivers, the Pasvikelva and Jakobselva.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Arctic cooperation and politics</span> Between the eight Arctic nations

Arctic cooperation and politics are partially coordinated via the Arctic Council, composed of the eight Arctic states: the United States, Canada, Iceland, Norway, Sweden, Finland, Russia, and Denmark with Greenland and the Faroe Islands. The dominant governmental power in Arctic policy resides within the executive offices, legislative bodies, and implementing agencies of the eight Arctic countries, and to a lesser extent other countries, such as United Kingdom, Germany, European Union and China. NGOs and academia play a large part in Arctic policy. Also important are intergovernmental bodies such as the United Nations and NATO.

Arctic Policy of Finland is Finland's foreign relations with other Arctic countries, and Finland's government policies on issues occurring within the geographic boundaries of "the Arctic" or related to the Arctic or its peoples. Since Finland is itself an Arctic nation, with roughly one third of its territory existing above the Arctic Circle, the Arctic Policy of Finland includes its domestic policies as regards the Finnish Arctic region. Finland's Strategy for the Arctic Region was released June 4, 2010 and concentrates on seven priorities: security, environment, economy, infrastructure, indigenous peoples, institutions and the European Union.

Sámi politics refers to politics that concern the Sámi ethnic group in Norway, Sweden, Finland and Russia. In a more narrow sense, it has come to indicate the government of Sámi affairs by Sámi political institutions. This article deals with Sámi political structures, with an emphasis on the contemporary institutions.

The Kola Sámi Assembly is an elected assembly established in 2010 by the Sámi people of the Kola peninsula in Russia on the model of Sámi parliaments in Nordic countries. As of 2018, it was not recognised as a political or legislative entity by the Russian federal nor local Murmansk Oblast governments under the pretext of "combatting separatism"; it remains a purely representative organ with unclear relations with the government, because establishing new legislative organs requires amendments to Russian federal and regional legislation.

Thomas Nilsen is a Norwegian journalist who has extensively covered oil drilling in the Arctic region. He was editor of the BarentsObserver, a Norwegian Arctic online newspaper based in Kirkenes, for six years before he was sacked in 2015. Norway’s public service broadcaster, NRK, claim Nilsen was sacked at the behest of the Russian intelligence service, the FSB.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Liberation of Finnmark</span> Campaign during World War 2 in Scandinavia

The Liberation of Finnmark was an Allied military operation lasting from 23 October 1944 until 26 April 1945, in which Soviet and Norwegian forces wrested away control of Finnmark, the northernmost county of Norway, from Germany. It began with a Soviet offensive that liberated Kirkenes.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Barents Euro-Arctic Council</span> Intergovernmental organization

The Barents Euro-Arctic Council (BEAC) is the official body for inter-governmental co-operation in the Barents Region. It seeks solutions wherever and whenever the countries can achieve more together than by working on their own. Cooperation in the Barents Euro-Arctic Region was launched in 1993 on two levels: intergovernmental Barents Euro-Arctic Council (BEAC) and interregional Barents Regional Council (BRC). The overall objective of Barents cooperation has been sustainable development.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Murmansk Initiative</span> 1987 Soviet foreign policy initiative

The Murmansk Initiative was a series of wide-range foreign policy proposals concerning the Arctic region made in a speech by the Secretary-General of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union - Mikhail Gorbachev - on October 1, 1987 in Murmansk, Soviet Union, considered to be a trademark of his foreign policy.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Arctic Railway</span> Planned railway connection from Northern Finland to the Arctic Ocean

The Arctic Railway is a planned railway line linking the Norwegian Arctic port of Kirkenes with the Finnish railway network.

Valentina Vyacheslavovna Sovkina is a Russian-Sami politician and chair of the Kola Sámi Assembly.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Arctic Economic Council</span> Independent international business membership organisation

The Arctic Economic Council (AEC) is an independent international business membership organisation representing companies that work with and within the Arctic. The AEC advocates sustainable economic development in the region and represents a business perspective on sustainability. The AEC is the only regional business organisation in the Arctic and has members from all eight Arctic states.

Far North Fiber, also called Far North Fiber Express Route, is a proposed 14,000 km long submarine fiber-optic cable connecting Japan and Europe by traversing the Northwest Passage. The cable was proposed in December, 2021 by Finnish company Cinia and Far North Digital of Anchorage, Alaska.

The Barents Observer is a Norwegian online newspaper which publishes news and op-ed content about the Barents Region in English, Russian and Chinese. The newspaper is based in Kirkenes and is owned by its journalists. It receives financial support from the European Endowment for Democracy, the Nordic Council of Ministers, the Norwegian government, the Fritt Ord foundation, private companies and individuals.

References

  1. https://www.nettavisen.no/nyheter/ordforer-kirkenes-samfunnet-endret-etter-ukraina-krigen/s/12-95-3424266066. Nettavisen.no. Retrieved 27 April 2022
  2. News from the Barents Region (About), barentsobserver.com, Retrieved August 5, 2011
  3. About BarentsObserver, old website, not updated since November 2015, as read on February 27, 2016.
  4. About us, The Independent Barents Observer, as read on February 27, 2016.

65°N44°E / 65°N 44°E / 65; 44