In Longyearbyen, Deputy Prime Minister Arkady Dvorkovich met with Odd Olsen Ingero, the Governor of Spitsbergen (Svalbard) Archipelago. The meeting focused on cooperation between the Russian Federation and the Kingdom of Norway in this region, particularly on joint research projects on climate change, coal production and transportation.
The Deputy Prime Minister also paid a visit to the Russian city of Barentsburg, which is also located on Spitsbergen, where he toured a power plant, inspected a hospital, a gymnasium and other social infrastructure facilities, and also talked to archipelago’s residents and tourists staying there.
In Murmansk, the Government Commission on the Russia’s Presence in the Svalbard (Spitsbergen) Archipelago held a meeting aboard the nuclear icebreaker Lenin. As the Commission’s Chairman, Arkady Dvorkovich opened the meeting by saying that Russia would expand its footprint on the Archipelago. “Today’s discussion will cover the whole range of activities carried out by Russian organisations on the Spitsbergen Archipelago from coal mining to tourism and research,” the Deputy Prime Minister said. The participants of the meeting discussed specific measures aimed at ensuring that the rights and interests of Russia, its citizens and organisations are secured on the Spitsbergen Archipelago. Special attention was paid to the development of tourism and cooperation between Russian and Norway on the archipelago.
Furthermore, the Deputy Prime Minister held a meeting at Gazflot on the implementation of the Treaty between Russian and the Kingdom of Norway on maritime delimitation and on cooperation in the Barents Sea and in the Arctic Ocean, which was ratified in 2011. In particular, the meeting discussed the issue of developing trans-border hydrocarbon fields and fishing.
In addition, Arkady Dvorkovich visited the Arkticheskaya jack-up floating drilling rig.
