Four of five asylum-seekers helped by traffickers of human beings (Nationen)

The Norwegian Directorate of Immigration predicts that a record number of 18 000 asylum-seekers will arrive in Norway in 2002. Six thousand have already arrived since the beginning of this year, hoping to be granted asylum or permission to stay on humanitarian grounds. This is as many as came 1995, 1996 and 1997. The National Bureau of Crime Investigation (Kripos) believes that Norway’s reputation is being exploited by human traffickers. In order to counter this development, it is important to prosecute human traffickers. Kripos is aware of the fact that organized traffickers in human beings in Russia and Eastern Europe publish instructions telling asylum-seekers what to say to the Norwegian authorities in order to be granted permission to stay in the country, and that "package deals", guarantees of permission to stay, and guarantees of being granted asylum are being sold.

More Norwegian passports being forged (Dagsavisen)

Misuse of passports is a growing problem all over Europe. The Norwegian Ministry of Local Government and Regional Development will consider imposing harsher penalties for the misuse of travelling documents and passports. The current penalty for forging a passport is five years’ imprisonment. The rule that a residence permit is automatically granted if the processing of an application takes more than 15 months applies only if the applicant can produce verified travelling documents. However, this increases the likelihood that people will choose to forge documents.

SAS monopoly will be broken (VG)

NAS (Norwegian Air Shuttle) will establish a low-price company that will take on SAS. The new company will also compete with train travel with regard to ticket prices. The new airline will not be called NAS, because that is too similar to SAS. According to company director Stig Willasen, if there is one thing the new company does not want to do, it is to resemble SAS. Next week the company will begin recruiting employees for its opening this autumn.

Vardåsen military camp to become prison (Aftenposten)

Minister of Justice Odd Einar Dørum wants to convert a military camp to a prison. The backlog of criminals waiting to serve their time in prison has already increased by 19 per cent thus far this year. Because the courts are dealing more efficiently with criminal cases, the backlog is now up to 2443. The prisons are full to bursting, and cannot take any more. The Prison Service will take over Vardåsen military camp this summer. In addition, Mr. Dørum will make the prisoners share cells.

Skagenfondene criticizes Røkke and Gerdt Larsen (Dagens Næringsliv)

The investment firms Storebrand Kapitalforvaltning, Odin Forvaltning and Skagenfondene have reacted to the gigantic golden parachutes DNO (Det Norske Oljeselskap A/S) has given its board members by reducing their investments. DNO’s powerful Berge Gerdt Larsen is one of the two worst offenders on the Oslo Stock Exchange in this area. Only Kjell Inge Røkke shows an equivalent lack of regard for the other stockholders, in the view of Kristian Falnes at Skagenfondene.

1.1 WORTH NOTING

• The Labour Party and Socialist Left Party want increased openness with regard to corporate executive salaries. They want to amend the Accounting Act and the stock market regulations in order to increase transparency in this area. The parties point out that the average Norwegian senior executive has more than doubled his own salary in the course of the past six years. (Dagsavisen)
• The Norwegian krone’s high exchange rate is responsible for the postponement of an increase in interest rates. Norges Bank is letting key rates remain at their current level for the time being, but it may decide to raise them as early as at its next meeting on 3 July. Norges Bank’s primary goal is to keep inflation under 2.5 per cent for the next two years. If the prognosis indicates that it will be higher, the bank will fight back with the means at its disposal – raising interest rates. (Vårt Land)
• A number of Norwegian organizations will probably have to cancel their planned trip to the environmental summit in Johannesburg. The reasons for this are twofold. Firstly, an application for funding from the Ministry of the Environment was answered too late, and secondly, the amount that was granted was far lower than the network organization ForUM (Forum for Development and Environment) had expected. (Klassekampen)
• Fattighuset, an organization for helping people who are on welfare to take control of their own lives, will not accept "blood money". Photographer Per Heimly decided to donate NOK 100 000 to Fattighuset, but the organization will not accept this money because Mr. Heimly earned it by selling photos of his personal friend Ari Behn, who will marry Princess Märthe Louise tomorrow, to a magazine. "We will not accept this blood money. What he did to his friend was unacceptable. Friendship is a wonderful thing, and should not be abused. He can’t just give money to the poor and think that that makes everything fine. After all, we are not a rubbish bin," said Mona Wilson, general manager at Fattighuset. (Dagbladet)

1.2 TODAY'S COMMENT from Dagens Næringsliv

It is not difficult to understand the frustration felt by municipal politicians in Vardø, who resigned from their positions yesterday in protest against cutbacks. In the course of the past 30 years the population of Vardø has been halved, and in the past few years jobs in both the public and private sectors have disappeared at an alarmingly high rate. The decision to close Vardø’s airport was the straw that broke the camel’s back. According to the predictions of all the statistical fortune tellers, Norway will undergo a radical centralization in the next few decades. Many small communities will be depopulated. Nowhere else in Norway have such comprehensive measures been implemented to maintain the population than in Finnmark, where Vardø is located, but they have not worked. Ideally, the public sector should be a service organ for the people and for civil society, but there is a limit to how many small communities without sustainable economies that can be maintained by society at large, and for how long. The goal of the government’s new policy for the outlying districts will be to maintain the population in regions, not in individual municipalities. This is a positive step. The next step ought to be establishing schemes that will help the people who are forced to move to avoid heavy private financial losses. Spending even more money on schemes that do not work will only postpone the inevitable. This will not be to anybody’s benefit.