Security in the High North - Western European Union Statement

Assembly of Western European Union
The Interparliamentary European Security and Defence Assembly
Fifty-third session
Security in the High North
Paris 5 June 2007
State Secretary Liv Monica Stubholt

I welcome the Assembly’s report on security in the High North, and I share the general views it expresses. While there are clearly perspectives and angles that do not fully correspond to the Norwegian Government’s views, the report is useful as a point of departure for discussing challenges and opportunities in the region.

The report supports Norway and other countries in the Arctic region “in maintaining the High North as a region of low tension, open to international research cooperation, so as to allow its potential as a future energy supplier region to be fully developed within a sustainable environmental framework”. When the Norwegian Government presented its High North Strategy on 1 December last year, our aim was to raise awareness of the strategic importance of the High North in terms of geopolitics, energy security and climate change. Increased activities in many sectors form the back-drop for the Norwegian Government’s emphasis on the High North. We see continued strong focus on the fisheries, tourism is on the rise, the transportation and logistics industry is growing, and we note an interest in harvesting new marine resources, including bio-prospecting activities.

Furthermore, I agree that climate change and energy supply are both part of a broader security concept. The key drivers in the Norwegian High North policy – climate change, energy and Russia – are part of our broader, more up-dated security concept. In my comments here today I will also address security issues in the more traditional sense. In this context, I would like to underscore the importance of NATO. Our membership of the alliance remains the most important element in our security cooperation in the High North.

The image behind me shows the geographical focus of the discussion today: this is the High North seen from above the North Pole – a photograph taken in the summer. In geographical terms, the High North covers the sea and land, including islands and archipelagos, stretching northwards from the southern boundary of Nordland county in Norway and eastwards from the Greenland Sea to the Barents Sea and the Pechora Sea.

In political terms, the High North includes the administrative entities in Norway, Sweden, Finland and Russia that are part of the Barents Cooperation. Furthermore, Norway’s High North policy interfaces with the Nordic cooperation, our relations with the US and Canada through the Arctic Council, and our relations with the EU through the Northern Dimension.

These cooperation arenas are referred to in the Assembly’s report. They were predominantly created in the 1990s as a consequence of the new international climate that developed after the break-up of the Soviet Union. The Assembly’s report asks whether security aspects are being sufficiently covered by the existing structures. It is an important and timely question. Foreign Minister Støre announced a couple of months ago that we will look more closely at the international architecture of cooperation in the High North. Climate change and energy issues have become increasingly important, and the existing cooperation structures do not necessarily provide the best tools for dealing with these issues. I believe this matter will be discussed in many settings in the time to come – but I would like to make this point now. In times of tension, as today, we should be very cautious about reducing our opportunities to meet and discuss matters of mutual importance. Each of the regional councils has its individual characteristics and identity.

Developments in the three areas that are the drivers of our High North policy give this region particular importance. Here, two of the world’s major petroleum suppliers, Norway and Russia, have a huge and largely untapped resource potential. And here too, as underlined in the Assembly’s report, climate change is happening first and fastest. The Arctic provides us all with an early warning of what the future will bring.

The report directs considerable attention to the more traditional security dimension of the High North – security in the military sense.

Norway enjoys close relations with Russia. Our policy towards Russia is based on pragmatism, common interests and cooperation. We are in frequent contact regarding both military and political issues, with focus on solving common tasks. Our relations with Russia constitute the central bilateral dimension of our High North policy. We are increasing our cooperation, in particular with regard to our common resources, such as energy and fish. We want to strengthen our ability to secure the vulnerable environment and ensure sustainable development of the vast resources in the north.

The situation we need to relate to today is the following. Norway and Russia share the Barents Sea and many of the sustainability challenges in the High North. We thus need to cooperate in a number of areas: on the harvesting of fish stocks, on exploration, production and technological developments in the petroleum sector, and on the adoption of health, safety and environmental standards for petroleum operations and maritime transport. All these sectors are included in the Norwegian High North strategy.

The Assembly’s report makes reference to the increase in the Russian defence budget. We do not perceive the modernisation of the Russian armed forces as a direct military threat to Norway; there is no indication that the Russian modernisation programme has an offensive character or that it is directed against Norway.
I would like to emphasise our interest in working with Russia in the fight against common threats, such as regional wars, terrorism and the spread of weapons of mass destruction. We welcome and encourage Russia as a security policy partner.
Norway would like Russia to take part in a joint political and practical effort to keep the Barents Sea clean, safe and rich in resources. Russia has welcomed our ambition of developing further cooperation on health, safety and sustainability in the area – particularly with regard to the energy sector and to the development of new energy sources and facilities. Both sides stand to gain from easy border crossings for skilled labour, cooperation on logistics networks and other infrastructure in the High North.

Although the military-strategic dimension in the north is less important today than it was during the Cold War, the Kola Peninsula and North-West Russia will continue to be an area of strategic importance for Russia. Russia maintains a considerable military presence in this region. This is a situation that Norway has to relate to, but it has no immediate influence on our good relations with Russia or the Norwegian military strategy. And we are of course watching developments in this part of Russia very closely. With regard to the report’s list of negative elements in east-west relations under Putin, I believe it is important, on a positive note, to highlight the Duma’s ratification of the SOFA agreement. 
Norway and Russia have good, but not substantial military relations. I would like to point out to you the direct contact established between the leadership of the Russian Northern Fleet and our Joint Operations Headquarters in Stavanger and our regional headquarters in Bodø. Norway, together with the other NATO member countries, wants to increase military cooperation with Russia. Focus is on interoperability, the ability to jointly meet international challenges, including anti-terror operations and crisis management. The NATO-Russia Council is an important tool in this regard.

I believe the Norwegian-Russian border should be more of a bridge than a barrier. I invite you to share this approach. We believe we should work together with Russia on the basis of common interests, common sense, respect and pragmatism.
With reference to the security aspect of climate change, I also welcome the  report’s comments on the recently published third report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change – the IPCC. We now know beyond reasonable doubt that climate change is man-made, that global warming is speeding up, in particular in the High North, and that we can halt it if we act swiftly – and indeed we must do so.
Everyone must contribute. Every country must take its part, according to capacity and individual conditions. Every responsible organisation and politician must joint the effort – and we must cooperate across sectors. I am therefore delighted to be able to discuss this issue with you as parliamentarians. And I am delighted that the United Nations Secretary-General is announcing the clear ambition to adopt an objective on making the UN carbon neutral – today, on World Environment Day, which is being celebrated in Tromsø, Norway.

Norway believes that we must cut our own emissions and at the same time assist developing countries in cutting their emissions. Therefore, the Norwegian Government has made a strategic decision. First, Norway will aim for a 30% reduction of carbon emissions by 2020. Second, by 2012 – the end of the Kyoto commitment period – we have set ourselves the target of voluntarily sharpening our emission cuts obligations by 10%. Third – looking further ahead – our overriding goal is to make Norway carbon neutral by 2050. Rapid technological progress is vital to achieving sustainable development. In the chapter about the High North and climate change, the report mentions that Norway is committed to reducing the environmental impact of fossil energy production and use. Let me elaborate on this point.
We need to be ambitious. We need to use many different tools to achieve our goal. We are developing our vision of moving towards decarbonisation through CO2 capture and storage. This may make it possible to continue to use fossil fuels without damage to the atmosphere. For Norway – as a major energy producer – one important question is: how can we help to meet the continued demand for hydrocarbons from the Norwegian continental shelf, thus contributing to energy security, and at the same time ensure reduced emissions of CO2? Companies operating on the Norwegian continental shelf have developed technologies that separate CO2 from the oil and gas produced, and reinject it into the reservoir for underground storage.

In the illustration behind me you can see how CO2 is reinjected into the Sleipner field in the North Sea. Since 1996, one million tonnes of CO2 per year has been separated from gas produced from this field and stored 1 000 metres below the seabed. This method has attracted considerable international attention. The question is whether underground storage of CO2 could also be feasible and commercially viable for power stations and other major industrial users of fossil fuels in Europe and beyond.

The European Commission has examined this question and set ambitious goals. Twelve demonstration projects are to be set up by 2015, and full-scale commercial facilities are expected to be in operation by 2020. It is our ambition that the Norwegian project described below will be selected as one of them.
Last autumn, we embarked on a major new research, development and demonstration project. Our aim is to build the world’s largest full-scale CO2 capture and storage facility in connection with a gas-fired combined heat and power plant at Mongstad on the west coast of Norway. The carbon capture and storage facility will be fully operational by 2014. The vision is that building a full-scale CO2 capture and storage facility will accelerate Norway’s transition to a low-carbon economy. And CO2 capture and storage figure among the key strategies in the fight against climate change identified in the latest IPCC report.

Today, Norway is the world’s third largest exporter of both oil and gas. We have an annual oil production of three million barrels per day and an annual gas production of 85 billion cubic metres. Early in the next decade, our export of gas – almost all of which is to Europe – will have risen by 50% to 130 billion cubic metres. This means that exports from Norway will account for nearly a third of natural gas consumption – or enough to cook every third meal – in France, Germany and the UK.

The Norwegian petroleum industry – which was born at the time of the first UN conference on the environment in Stockholm 35 years ago – has been well schooled in sustainable development. Norway was the first nation to introduce a CO2 tax on petroleum production in the early 1990s. Not surprisingly, the industry objected to the tax. But times have changed. Environmental regulations and taxation have spurred technological innovation and made our industry more – not less – competitive in world markets. Today, the Norwegian continental shelf is the most energy-efficient petroleum producing region in the world. CO2 emissions from Norwegian production amount to less than one third of the global average per unit produced.

Mr President, I would like to thank those of you who took the trouble to travel to Svalbard in May this year. We appreciate this political interest in the High North and in climate change issues in particular. Let me add here a few points about the status of Svalbard. Norway has sole sovereignty over the archipelago. I know I am going through an open door in saying this, as no-one disputes it.
There are, however, certain differences of view with regard to the geographical scope of some of the provisions of the 1920 Treaty concerning equal treatment and taxation. The Svalbard treaty is clear on this: it applies to the land territory and to the territorial waters. The references to territorial waters actually mean what they say.

It is thus Norway’s clear position that the treaty does not apply to the 200-mile zone or the continental shelf. The regime of the economic zone and other 200-mile zones does not, according to established international law, result from a conversion of prior territorial waters. We will all benefit if the High North continues to be a peaceful and stable region. I hope for the support of all of you in avoiding unnecessary tension. Let us do what we do well. This will allow Norway to exercise its rights and meet its obligations – not least to ensure a sustainable environment.

In conclusion, let me thank you for this opportunity to address an issue of great importance to the Norwegian Government. As illustrated in the Assembly’s report and highlighted in my intervention, the challenges and opportunities in the High North are linked to the broader security concept, including energy and climate security.