Britain, along with Japan, Canada, Australia, Korea and Norway could create a network of safe and neutral financial and service havens: the G4N.
Britain, along with Japan, Canada, Australia, Korea and Norway could create a network of safe and neutral financial and service havens: the G4N.
China tried to save face last week, by lashing out at those critical of its human rights record during a meeting of the UN Human Rights Council.
In his most recent flamboyant sign of making a clear break with the past, Viktor Orbán, Hungary’s Prime Minister, has taken the unexpected step of moving out of the Hungarian equivalent of the White House, choosing instead a not-too-shabby castle in the historical Buda Castle District, the former place of residence for Hungary’s kings of yore.
Although last week’s Arctic Frontiers conference in Tromsø, Norway focused on the activities of “humans in the Arctic,” from sleeping habits to snowmobile accidents in Svalbard, top politicians still made headline appearances. The Prime Minister of Norway, along with Greenland’s Prime Minister and Finland’s Foreign Minister, spoke on Tuesday, the second day of the conference. […]
Arctic Frontiers, an annual conference on development in the Arctic intended largely to bring together policy makers, scientists, and academics, took place for the ninth year in a row in Tromsø, Norway. The theme of this year’s conference focused on “Humans in the Arctic.” The more prosaic, but no less important, conference theme contrasted with […]
High frequency trading (HFT) of securities has become a high-profile target on both sides of the Atlantic in recent weeks. On September 2, Italy began imposing a tax of 0.02 percent on many order changes and cancellations that occur within 0.5 seconds of the original order. Later that month, the managers of the world’s largest […]
Oil and gas. Uranium and rare earth metals. Cod and shrimp. Reindeer and seal pelts. These things constitute the bulk of discussions about Arctic resources, yet there’s one resource that’s overlooked: time. At the Arctic Circle summit in Reykjavik earlier in October, economist and Sami reindeer herder Anders Johansen Eira gave a talk, “The Challenges of […]
In my previous post, I noted how there isn’t likely to be a dramatic shift in Norway’s Arctic policy even though the Conservatives will now be at the helm of government. Regardless of whether Labour or the Conservatives dominate, oil will still be one of Norway’s top priorities in the Arctic. But questions remain as […]
In Norway’s elections on Monday, the Conservative party (Høyre) won the most seats, sweeping Labour Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg from power after eight years. The Conservatives, however, did not win enough seats to form a majority government. As such, headed by new Prime Minister Erna Solberg, they will likely ally with the populist, anti-immigrant Progress […]
Just last year, protestors in Nunavut spoke out against the high cost of milk and other basic foodstuffs. But few international media outlets paid attention to these protests, even though they touched upon an issue just as central to the Arctic as the environment: human development and well-being. In comparison, the scaling of The Shard, […]
The Arctic Council, the most important multilateral organization in the circumpolar north, opened the offices for its permanent secretariat in Tromsø, Norway on Monday. This is an important moment for the now 17 year-old body because it visibly signifies to the rest of the world that the Arctic Council exists outside of the ethereal alphabet […]
DefenseNews has a thought-provoking analysis of NATO’s announcement earlier this month that it had no plans to establish a direct presence in the Arctic. On May 6 and 7, NATO Secretary-General Anders Fogh Rasmussen and ambassadors from the North Atlantic Council visited Bodø, Norway, where the Norwegian Armed Forces’ operational command center is located. Rasmussen […]
Asia in, EU not yet China, Japan, South Korea, Singapore, India and Italy have all been admitted as permanent observer states to the Arctic Council, while the EU will have to wait. Though technically admitted, it still must work out its differences with Canada. Countries are admitted as permanent observer states by consensus between the […]
Yesterday, I mentioned in a blog post that Eimskip, the Icelandic shipping company, recently moved its North American hub from Norfolk, Virginia to Portland, Maine. This will be the American port’s first direct connection to Europe in 33 years, according to an excellent, fact-filled article in the Press Herald, a local newspaper. Eimskip’s decision is in line […]
German Chancellor Angela Merkel traveled to Oslo this week to meet with Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg to discuss the euro crisis and energy issues, including cooperation in the Arctic. This was the pair’s fifth meeting in nine months. Stoltenberg stressed the importance of German and European companies in assisting with the development of the Arctic […]