Russia may still send goods from Norway to Barentsburg on Svalbard – news Troms and Finnmark

This is confirmed by press spokesperson Ane Lunde in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to news on Wednesday afternoon. – Two containers with supplies to Barentsburg are now on their way in a Norwegian ship to Longyearbyen. She says that it has never been their intention to stop supplies to Svalbard. – But due to the sanctions, they could not enter with the Russian registered vehicle that they were on. A Norwegian carrier has transported it to Tromsø. Lunde says that they have been in dialogue with the Russian authorities that there have been opportunities to transport goods to Longyearbyen. This was one of them. – These are solutions that have been in the spotlight all along. At the end of May, 20 tonnes of Russian goods were stopped at Storskog, the border between Norway and Russia. The goods were in two containers that were to be transported by truck from the border to Tromsø and so on by freight boat to the Russian mining town of Barentsburg on Svalbard. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs states that the containers were transported by a Norwegian lorry from Storskog to Tromsø, and that they were transported on by freight boat from Tromsø and to Svalbard. This boat is now on its way to Svalbard. On 15 June, the Norwegian authorities said no to shipping the goods via Norway on the grounds of the sanctions against Russia. The application from the Russians stated that they fear a humanitarian crisis if the goods are not allowed to pass Storskog. The rejection from Norway has created strong reactions. On Tuesday, the head of the State Duma, (the lower house of the Russian parliament), Vyacheslav Volodin, stated that he had informed the Foreign Affairs Committee in parliament to consider the dividing line agreement between Norway and Russia. The 40-year-old agreement clarified the border relationship between Norway and Russia in the Barents Sea and the Arctic Ocean. The goods to Barentsburg follow this itinerary. From Murmansk to Tromsø by truck, while Bring with M / S Nordbjørn brings the goods to Barentsburg. Bring has the only freight boat that runs in regular traffic to Svalbard and sails to the archipelago every ten days.



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