Head of the city council of Petrozavodsk Vasily Popov says he is being punished for accusing the pro-Kremlin Karelia’s regional head Sergei Katanandov of corruption and requesting he be sacked, reports Reuters.
Norway will benefit from the other Nordic countries’ closer integration in maritime and air space issues in the High North, newspaper Nordlys writes in an editorial. The Svalbard archipelago can become the core in a future Nordic cooperation in the Arctic, the newspaper maintains.
The Finnish government’s report on security policy was this morning handed over to the Finnish Parliament. The report proposes a two percent increase in defence spending.
The Russian Anti-Monopoly Service will not approve a merger of Norilsk Nickel, Rusal, Metalloinvest, an official in the anti-trust watchdog said this week.
The Swedish Central Bank today lowered interest rates to a historically low one percent. The economic downturn is worse than expected, the bank admits. Also the northern parts of the country are increasingly affected.
The Russian Ministry of Transport last week approved the Belkomur investment project. That might put the projected railway line between Perm and Arkhangelsk an important step forward. Several experts still remain skeptical towards the railway plans.
The Russian state-owned company Arktikmorneftegazrazvedka is experiencing hardships. For the first time in ten years, the company entered January with a negative profit. Salary debts to company workers amounts to nearly 700 000 EUR. The company is in negotiations with Zarubezhneft about leasing of its rigs.
A new federal law soon to be signed by President Dmitry Medvedev will make it far easier for municipal councils to dismiss mayors. The law places more power in the hands of regional legislators, but could eventually also strengthen the power of the governors and the United Russia Party.
The new Norwegian radiation monitoring system includes 11 locations in northern Norway and Svalbard. Radiation-levels are updated every hour and easily available for everyone on the Radnett web.
The fight for opening Lofoten in northern Norway for petroleum activity is intensifying. − It is absurd that the danger of minimal losses for the fishing industry are more important than the several billion EUR of possible incomes from oil and gas production in Lofoten, says Norwegian economist Rögnvaldur Hannisson.
