Arctic Russia

norway’s balancing act

Coming after the agreement over the Barents Sea and this week’s announcment of naval joint-exercises between Russia and Norway, which will test inter-operability in various scenarios such as emergency and rescue, armed attack on instillations, Norway is now focussing its Arctic diplomacy on the Arctic Council.  The report in иносми is actually a translation of a Canadian article and this is interesting as the order of points is: Norway recognizes the need to strengthen the Arctic Council, there is room for practical and pragmatic cooperation such as the recent Barents Sea agreement, the Russian Ambassador also recognizes the room for cooperation ETC. and then, but … there follows some comment from Canadian sources, a political scientist, who points to a military build-up. 

The Russian Ambassador dismissed these remarks as coming from another planet but is it possible to detect a slight hint of annoyance from Canada about the Barents Sea agreement so that all of a sudden the Norwegians have discovered a new enthusiasism for running discussion about drilling in the Arctic through the council. 

Perhaps they should have thought of that a couple of weeks before when they were boasting about their mastery of secrecy.

Norway was also keen for China to have greater representation on the Arctic Council which, I cannot help but think, is not a policy the Russians will push with great urgency.  Only this week, a Chinese representative from the Chinese Arctic and Antarctic Research Institute described the Arctic’s resources as ‘global’, while also indicating that China is stepping up its Arctic research program.