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Norway wants regional border certificates

Foreign Minister Stшre (Barentsphoto.com)

Norwegian Minister of Foreign Affairs Jonas Gahr Støre will in today’s meeting with Russia’s Sergey Lavrov propose the establishment of special cross-border travel permissions for the people living in the Norwegian-Russian borderlands.

Location

The travel certificates will be one of the proposals of Mr. Støre when he today meets with Sergey Lavrov in Kirkenes Norway, the Norwegian News Agency (NTB) reports for newspaper Nordlys. -We accept 98 percent of all visa applications from the Russian side, and this takes very much time, the foreign minister says. –We now consider that the people living near the border get special permissions which will facilitate easier cross-border travelling, he adds. -The question deserves to be raised. We will have to see how the Russians will react on the proposal. About 45,000 people live in the Russian municipality of Pechenga, located along the border to Norway and Finland. On the Norwegian side, about 10,000 people live in the municipality of Sør-Varanger.