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China is accelerating its pace in Arctic exploration by publishing its first guide to sailing through the Northern Sea Route.

Greenpeace’s vessel «Arctic Sunrise» has been released after nearly nine months of detention in Murmansk, following the organization’s demonstration against Arctic drilling in the Pechora Sea last fall.

Permafrost may be mostly invisible underground, but the consequences of its thawing will be anything but.

The melting Arctic ice-cap changes the geopolitical map in the north. Now, China is preparing for the Arctic being navigable during summer months, according to a report released this week.

A Russian nuclear powered icebreaker sets out from Murmansk later this week to pick up scientists and equipment from a floating research station in the Arctic.

Prime Minister Wen Jiabao is ready to tour Sweden and Iceland in a bid for his country’s permanent observer status.

The expedition will visit the territory of the national park “Russian Arctic” with the aim to collect scientific data to form the basis for the park’s future.

The promised record number of vessels using the Northern Sea Route between Europe and Asia seems to be somewhat delayed. In course of the two first months of sailing, only nine vessels of different types have taken the journey.

Norway will finally get its first ice-classed research vessel that can sail in the High Arctic.

OSLO: Regional cooperation across the border remains a key priority in relations between Norway and Russia, Norwegian Foreign Minister Espen Barth Eide underlines.

BUGØYNES: The temperature is minus 15 degrees Celsius and the freezing wind is howling around the front of the small fishing vessel “Vesterelvjenta” as she crosses the Varangerfjord. It is the polar night period of the year in the far north, but extreme weather does not set king crab fishing on hold.

Non-Arctic Japan yesterday appointed an Arctic ambassador – a move intended to prepare the country’s admission to the Arctic Council as a permanent observer.

Three Greenpeace activists in polar bear consumes were arrested during their street protest against Statoil and Rosneft plans to drill in the Russian Arctic.

The world’s largest residential yacht «MS The World» on Sunday left Kirkenes for a two weeks long journey to the White Sea and Russian Arctic National Park.

KOLGUYEV: Russia has produced oil for hundreds of millions on this island in the Barents Sea, but the local Nenets people have not seen much of the income. Today, they were visited by the Nansen Memorial Expedition.