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Russian deputies urged to denounce Arctic treaty with Norway

Russia's top lawmaker on Tuesday said parliamentary deputies should consider denouncing a landmark Arctic border treaty with Norway as tensions rage between the two countries.

Published: 5 July 2022 15:22 CEST
Pictured is a trawler in the Barents Sea.
Russia has said that parliamentary deputies should look at denouncing a treaty with Norway. File photo: The Norwegian Coast Guard boards this unregistered trawler "Joana" fishing illegally in the Barents Sea. Photo by Norwegian Coast Guard / Scanpix / AFP

The announcement comes with Moscow accusing Oslo of blocking access to the Svalbard archipelago and ties between the Kremlin and European countries unravelling over Russia’s military intervention in Ukraine.

In 2010, Russia and Norway signed a treaty on maritime delimitation and cooperation in the Barents Sea and Arctic Ocean, putting to rest a
40-year-old row.

On Tuesday, Vyacheslav Volodin, speaker of parliament’s lower house, the State Duma, tasked lawmakers with considering “the issue of denunciation of the agreement with Norway on cooperation in the Barents Sea and the Arctic Ocean,” the State Duma said.

Volodin backed Communist lawmaker Mikhail Matveyev said that in 2010 Russia “had ceded 175,000 square kilometres of the Barents Sea to Norway”.

Today, Norway is preventing the delivery of food and cargo to Spitsbergen,” the State Duma said in a statement, citing Matveyev.

READ ALSO: Norway says it hasn’t breached treaty by blocking Russian cargo to Svalbard

Last week Russia’s foreign ministry summoned Norway’s charge d’affaires, accusing Oslo of blocking access to the Svalbard archipelago and threatening retaliation.

Norway has sovereignty over Svalbard but allows citizens of more than 40 countries to exploit the islands’ potentially vast resources on an equal footing.

Moscow has long wanted a bigger say in the archipelago and insists on calling it Spitsbergen rather than the Norwegian Svalbard.

After President Vladimir Putin sent troops to Ukraine in February, the West has hit Russia with several rounds of unprecedented sanctions.

Last week Norway announced nearly a billion euros of aid to Ukraine.

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SVALBARD

Norway calls off sale of last private land in Arctic Svalbard

The Norwegian government called offa plan to sell the last privately owned piece of land on the strategic Arctic archipelago of Svalbard on Monday in order to prevent its acquisition by China.

Published: 1 July 2024 12:35 CEST
Norway calls off sale of last private land in Arctic Svalbard

The remote Sore Fagerfjord property in southwestern Svalbard — 60 square kilometres (23 square miles) of mountains, plains and a glacier — was on sale for 300 million euros ($326 million).

The archipelago is located halfway between mainland Norway and the North Pole, in an Arctic region that has become a geopolitical and economic hotspot as the ice melts and relations grow ever frostier between Russia and the West.

Svalbard is governed under an unusual legal framework that allows foreign entities to gain footholds in the region.

A treaty signed in 1920 recognises Norwegian sovereignty over the territory but it also gives citizens of the signatory powers — which include Russia and China — the same rights to exploit its mineral resources.

Russia, for example, has maintained a coal mining community on Svalbard, via the state-run company Trust Arktikugol, for decades.

Yet Norway, keen to protect its sovereignty, would not look kindly on the property falling into foreign hands, and the government said Monday a potential sale will require state approval under national security law.

“The current owners of Sore Fagerfjord… are open to selling to actors that could challenge Norwegian legislation in Svalbard,” Trade and Industry Minister Cecilie Myrseth said.

“It could disturb stability in the region and potentially threaten Norwegian interests,” she added.

Lawyer Per Kyllingstad, who represents the sellers, has previously told AFP that he had received “concrete signs of interest” from potential Chinese buyers who have “been showing a real interest in the Arctic and Svalbard for a long time.”

The piece of land is a unique occasion to grab the “last private land in Svalbard, and, to our knowledge, the last private land in the world’s High Arctic,” he said.

Kyllingstad did not immediately respond to the government announcement.

The property’s seller is a company controlled by a Russian-born Norwegian, according to local media.

Critics are sceptical about the price and feasibility of the sale. The property, in the southwest of the archipelago where no infrastructure exists, covers protected areas where construction and motorised transport are prohibited, stripping it of commercial value.

In 2016, the government paid 33.5 million euros to acquire the second-last piece of private land on Svalbard, near Longyearbyen, which was also reportedly being eyed by Chinese investors.

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