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Next January marks the 20th anniversary of the Barents cooperation. The event provides an opportunity to review lessons learned after 20 years of cooperation and identify new challenges and priorities for the future cooperation. BarentsObserver invites you to voice your views here.

Europe’s northernmost inter-regional cooperation is a political initiated structure established after the end of the Cold War and aims at boosting contacts across formerly nearly closed borders.

The Barents Regional Council unites 13 member counties and a representative of the indigenous peoples in the northernmost parts of Finland, Norway and Sweden and northwest Russia.

The Barents Euro-Arctic Council (BEAC) is the forum for intergovernmental cooperation on issues concerning the Barents Region.

The Norwegian Barents Secretariat is a cross-border competence center that aims at developing the relations in the north by promoting and funding Norwegian-Russian cooperation projects.

In addition to the Norwegian Barents Secretariat, several other secretariats and centers have been established. Some still exists, others are gone. Here is the historical overview.