 Takk, og det er en fantastisk pleit å være her i denne instituen. Jeg er for mange år nå en minister og først en deputatsminister, men min origin er i ekonomisk verden, og jeg var for mange år i den Norvigens Institut for Internationale Affæren. Så jeg føler alltid mye at hjem når jeg er i en institut for å lære, og forhållelse og forskning, selvfølgelig. Og jeg er veldig glad for å ha denne muligheten til å share med dere mine og Norvigens muligheter på arktiske. Det er definitivt en region som er karterisert, både med en stor mulighet, men også med kjallenge, mener om ekologisk eller politisk. Og jeg tror det er et tema som skal interessere landene, selv hvis de ikke er direkte arktiske landene. Og vi begynner å se ut at landene i mange deler av the world har en stor interesser for hva som er gjennom. Når jeg gikk en løsning på mange av de simulige problemer i Singapore, er de ikke particularst arktiske i klimat, samtidig løsninger i Dublin, selv om de er 1 grader norsk av ekvater, så i hvert fall er de på den større side av det vendinglinje. Men deres interesser, selvfølgelig, er det for å skjønne naturen. Så bare til å illustrere at det er en bred, og jeg kommer til å spille hvorfor, men det er en bred rang av landene og områder, som er nå interesseret i de mage skjønne som er gjennom i arktiske, hva det betyr, og hva det kan begynne for forfølgelig. Norge, selvfølgelig, har en stor polertradisjon. Vi usede å gjøre eksploittasjon og eksplorasjoner av både Nordpol og Søtpol, og Arlen har også en polertradisjon med Søren Arnes tennerhjækkelton, som var engageret og som er ganske ganske ganske ganske ganske ganske ganske, dvs. polertradisjon. Og også en ganske ganske ganske ganske ganske ganske ganske, som var engageret i mange av de Søtpol eksploittasjoner, og så gikk de til å sette opp en publikasjon, eller en liten pøbb i landet, som var ganske enn Kari, som var ganske enn Søtpol innen. Og later har han vært, som jeg har tatt, i en Guinness-advertisjement, sagt at Guinness er god for deg, noe på Søtpol. Så det er en ærlig historie som også til polen. Jeg har en slags, jeg håper du kan alle se dem, om den arktiske, den nye crossroads. Og det jeg refererer til er de crossroads, også i geografiske termene, de tre av de mest dynamiske ekonomiske i verden, eller de tre mest dynamiske ekonomiske i verden, i Østernasien, Europa og Nordamerika. Klimatet har blitt ganske fast. Det er selvfølgelig bade news, og jeg vil prefere alt jeg vil si om oppgjortning, gjennom å gjøre det veldig klart, at en av de reisene behind denne ganske interesse i arktiske er klimatet, ekologisk ganske, og det er definitivt ikke gode news. Det er en sign av global warming. Global warming er fast på polen, og i alle partier på planetet. En 2 % celsius-degåning, generell på planetet, vil lede til en 4 % increase på både polen, fordi på hvor klimatet fungerer. Så det er en naturlig ting, og det vi kan se i arktisken, er at det ikke er kreativt i arktisken, men de konsekvenser som har vært i arktisken. Det er en poler projektsjon i verden. Vi er veldig ganske like denne mapen i Norge, fordi det viser hvor sentralt vi er. De mer tradisjone mapene som du bruker å se, har gammelt oss veldig far, og på enden av verden, men her er vi ganske mer sentralt, så vi preferer denne, jeg tror det er det. Arlen er over her, så vi er på mapen, og ikke så far, men vi ser på det som vi ser. Det er en projektsjon når det er stort mye av iken. Men de mener når denne iken melder, som det er, først er denne iken ganske, jeg har en bild av det lager. Iken er ganske ganske ganske ganske ganske ganske, men det er også ganske å begynne å begynne å begynne å begynne å begynne. Så vi tar mer iken over på kanadens side, og det er en kanadens og alaskans side, og det er en less on our side, hvilket, som betyr, fortsatt til nord, og til norske passager, og eventuelt til en polertransportrout mellom Europa og Asia, er å presentere seg som relevant. Når vi prøver om arkitektiske eller høy norske issue, som vi bruker å gjøre i denne norske setningen, er det en multid av issue som kommer opp. Det er selvfølgelig det issue av sekuritet, både internationale sekuritet, men også sikkerhet og sekuritet, hvordan vi sikker at vi har bra kontroll over disse issue, klimat, som driver har sagt, en frå på juristikken, hva begynner til hvem, og hvordan vi solver potenskere disputer om hva begynner til hvem. Iskjus av skjipping, først en oppgjortning til å gjøre mer destinasjoner. Skjipping som ikke går gjennom arkitektiske, men for norske arkitektiske. Først en eksempel på Røsja. Røsja er hittet på globalt skjipping, i flere sikkerheter, men en av dem er at mange sikkerheter i norsk Røsja er nødvendig av skjipping, i en lang tid av året. Norsk sommer i denne senten, blir det langt. I samme tid, meldingen av permafrost, den permanentlige frosen, parten av tundra, meldingen, og det er det som er svært, de traditionelle, on-land transportrød, røde, røde, sittet, som er byggt på toppen av tundra, brenger ned. Jeg har sett pictures av en sovjet-erariet, voksne, som er faktisk kollapser, fordi det er byggt på frosen land, og det er ikke frosen langt. Så de både kan gjøre mer av transport i norsk, destinasjoner. Men også så transitt-sjipping er ganske relevant. Arktisk er en lage area, og det er ingen absolutt ganske definisjere av hva det er, de siste og mest ganske ganske definisjere er everything north of the Arctic Circle, det er en ganske significant part of the world, everything from 66.67 and upwards degrees north. And there are also different temperature range definitions. But anyway there are a number of countries who are actually in the Arctic. A more than half of Norway's territory is in the Arctic and there are a lot of people living in the Arctic in Norway, in Alaska, in Russia and of course on Greenland which is why Denmark should be added to the list of Arctic countries. It's an Arctic country through Denmark through Greenland. Here's a picture of the changing ice landscape. Last year we had the lowest recorded extension of the ice cap in recorded time actually. Although it's not completely linear because it goes a little bit up and down, the long trend line is that this is going to continue and we have already done things on the globe which will make it continue to go in this direction even if we all went on bicycle stop driving, stopped hitting our houses today. So the long term effects of already existing should we say investments in global warming. On the opportunity side this means that there are new areas that become interesting for exploitation of energy, for instance. This is a LNG facility in the very high Norwegian north and an LNG transport ship which puts liquid fried gas and export them to basically anywhere you'd like. They can go to North America. The demand is decreasing because of the fast growth of American self dependence on energy or to Europe or also to Asia where the demand is rising. When gas transports become more LNG based it also means that the gas as a commodity the nature of the commodity is changing because traditionally gas has been transported and still is of course in pipelines which requires a very long term agreement first to build it and then in order to finance it there must be a continued agreement security of demand, security of supply for many many years. Now with the LNG you can put the gas on the ship and you can sail it and just like oil you can actually sell the contents on the ship while the ship is sailing so it's a completely different commodity in the international markets and access to exploitation further north is becoming possible access to transport all this comes together so the Arctic is becoming a significant energy region Norway of course is a major exporter of both oil and gas but in Norway as well as other parts of the world the percentage of oil is going down relative to the gas and the percentage of oil gas is going up. We actually actively promote natural gas as an important bridge to countries that are undergoing sort of an what the Germans call the energy bend or the striving towards more renewable energy but also as a permanent composition of a more environmentally friendly energy because it's the cleanest of the non-redubles so it's less clean than hydroelectric and so on but it's more clean than obviously cold and oil and so on so this is important for us but it's even more important for Russia and it's important in Alaska and it's important in Canada and this is a big thing the American geological survey is suggesting that more than 20% of the remaining undiscovered oil and gas reserves are likely to be in what we refer to as the Arctic this is also an area of very rich fishing potential and not only potential it's being utilized we have a large fishing fleet of course they can now go further north so can others and they have to because the fish is also changing their patterns with global warming certain types of fish stocks are looking for colder waters cold for instance are moving where they actually go because of the changing temperature so new issues new opportunities we see this as on the global strategic issue because we are currently 7 billion people on the planet some calculations suggest that will be at least 9 billion before it sort of flattens out and there's hardly enough food that can be produced on land but there is a tremendous potential in producing more proteins at sea but only if we manage our waters well not only managing the fish stocks but also managing the ecological conditions under which the fish live so this is also a major issue and of course the intersection between energy, exploitation and fish is clearly important and needs a holistic approach minerals there are in the Arctic on land and offshore there are significant precious metals and other minerals for which there is a high demand Norway surprisingly to some is now again becoming a major exporter of metals and of minerals this is actually loading a ship with iron ore which is going from from Kirkenes in northern Norway the most northe eastern corner of Norway to China or Japan to the northwest it's happening it's not sort of science fiction it's happening this ship has sailed it has arrived and there are several transports like that so it's also a kind of a mineral region shipping when rather than if I say when but when the northeast passage has become even more commercially attractive region or transport route it will reduce the time it takes to sail from Yokohama to Rotterdam or the other way around by 40% shorter and at least in summer time where there is hardly any ice almost normal speeds which means it's also 40% faster and you avoid sort of conflictual areas like the Malacca straits the Bay of Alden and so on as I told this audience I referred to in Singapore it will take many many many years before this is the dominant route this is not just about like a couple of years this is the dominant route but it's a supplementary route which is going to be interested for certain types of shipping which also when this really is happening it means that if you remember the first picture of the polar cap the traditional conception that the world continues up to the north pole and that's the end will then be substituted with the conception that the world goes up to the north pole and then it continues on the other side which of course was always true but conceptually not the way we saw it it's just the way to connect to other continents and it's going to happen big time between all these issues shipping which also has ecological dimensions first because there is a risk of accidents of course oil spills but also because shipping itself does affect the natural habitat it brings waters from one part of the for one type of climate and one habitat to another oil and gas exploitation, fishing itself other exploitation of minerals all of this of course has to be managed in a cohesive an integrated fashion between countries who are interested in this that's an ambition I think every Arctic Sage shares but of course going from the ambition to actually doing it is going to be challenging so there is a lot of research going on the Spitsbergen islands or Svalbard as we call them are increasingly a center of international research a number of countries have established have used the right to free the free access to establish oneself in Svalbard also to establish research stations and there is a lot of specialized investigation going on and this which including in the small town of Ni-Oldersund which is the northern most place where people live the whole year around in the world and that is on Arctic research it's on climate research and it's on how to use the potential and it's an international cooperation arena in itself what is incredibly important that's my one takeaway message from the speech which is more important than everything else I say is that the international convention or the UN convention or the law of disease applies to the Arctic this is not only me saying as the Norwegian Foreign Minister but every Arctic State Greece that any dispute should be settled under the auspices of the institution set up under the law of disease convention that's very important that includes America despite of the fact that the US never has ratified although several presidents from both parties have tried does not preclude that the US actually explicitly declares that they see themselves as bound by the obligations of the unclos very important unfortunately for them they are not entitled to the rights so I often question in the US why do you want to join in a way where you only have obligations and are right that's up to them but that's what they do and so does Russia Denmark, so does Canada, so do we and all the Arctic States agree on this this should of course be obvious in order to make sure there was no disagreement on this we had a meeting of the directly Arctic countries those were directly affected by you know you're actually in the Arctic in Ilulisat in Greenland in 2008 and came up with the foreign ministers declaration just confirming that this is the agreement and there are less and less disputed areas we settled our issue I'll show you a map afterwards we settled our issue with the Russians for 40 years of negotiations just before Christmas one of the remaining disagreements between Canada and Denmark was solved in the Lincoln Sea and there were several other processes which suggest that less and less of the Arctic is actually disputed and it's important to say that because there is a popular conception in many parts of the world that there is a kind of race for the Arctic it's a kind of Klondike it's free for all and who comes first can grab the resources that's not true most of the interesting resources are actually within what is the agreed boundaries or agreed legal economic zone of either country and that means that this is in principle an ocean that is very well you know very well placed for being an ocean of cooperation and not conflict and that has been very central to our high north policies is to say that this is the high north but there is low tension Norway and Russia originally the Norway and the Soviet Union actually had for 40 years until 2010 which means from around 1970 disagreed about where the the lineation should be between their two economic zones but what is extremely important is not the details of what these sort of stippled lines are but is that Russia and the Soviet Union before them agreed that this should be settled according to international law there was not like in the in some other parts of the world where there is a dispute between those who are saying these are historic rights anyway and those who claim international law agreed that international law applies it was just that their lawyers had an interpretation more favorable to them and our lawyers had an interpretation more favorable to us surprise 170 6,000 square kilometers of quite attractive waters so it's quite significant but eventually we were able to draw a line and that was based on obviously political will to get it settled but also based on an actual closing of the legal disagreement by good lawyers on both side or good legal expert on both side agreeing about more and more of what would be the final settlement over many years and it's very good to say that for us that we now have no disagreements with anyone in our neighborhood we have neither land border nor maritime sovereign borders nor economic zone border disputes with anyone and that's increasingly the case for the Arctic I think it's very important just look at the South China Sea to see a comparative example this refreshment over time has led to a quite good cooperation with Russia this is from the Russia-Norwegian border you see normal people up there there is people to people contact more and more border crossing and the state to state relationship between my country and Russia is good and stable and predictable we of course are seeing some of the same domestic developments within Russia when it comes to the extent of democracy and NGO laws and some which we take up and criticize as everybody else but the bilateral relationship is good at the same time the Kola peninsula is remains the most important military base of Russia most of the strategic armory the nuclear weapons submarine based or aircraft based are in the high north not because of us, not because of the Arctic but simply because that's the most interesting place for them to be for strategic purposes so we are at the same time a neighbor of still quite potent military power just across the border from us this is a nuclear powered and nuclear armed submarine this class of submarines hold 16 nuclear missiles each and it's an important part of the second strike capability of Russia which they take still take quite seriously so we also see the Russians in their military activities I used to be defense minister and was quite a lot involved in this and this was if not weekly it was quite often this is a Norwegian F16 meeting Russian strategic bomber outside on the right side of our borders not violating anything but following the Norwegian border down to the United Kingdom area responsibility and we respond to that by going up and calling them and escorting them down so we have disengagement as well and for balance it should be said so we have a rather significant part of our military capabilities in the north but not directed against anyone not because we think this is an area of conflict simply because there is a lot to look after and the military is a part of that endeavor then towards the end there I'll mention the the main international institutions of course I did mention the law of the seas convention and all the bodies that comes out of that but we have also over the last year strengthened the Arctic Council and the Arctic Council has eight members that's Russia, Canada US, Denmark Norway, Sweden, Finland and Iceland and a number of observers and there is a big debate in the Arctic Council and around it about whether to open up for more observers including European Union as such and China and South Korea and a number of other interested parties mine is that we should open up because it's good that these countries and institutions are interested in what's going on in the Arctic and also because we think it's better that we use the forum that is already in place rather than creating an alternative forum but there are, I think it's publicly known different views about that within the Arctic Council to which extent we should keep it as a closed trap and to which extent we should open up to more observers members are likely to remain traditional members who are close to actually being in the Arctic this is one, this is a Chinese vessel who has been very active over the last year in the Arctic it's called the Snow Dragon very nice Chinese name and the Snow Dragon is there because China for perfectly logical reasons is interested in what's going on it's interested in understanding what's the potential and is interested in resources all over the world and they have a significant research effort and they're more than welcome but it's sort of one of the players that we are seeing increasingly active also in the Arctic so back to my point this is not only for directly active countries actually boarding the Arctic as a search I'll end there this is just a reminder that this is a place where people live it's not a kind of ultimatule where you find no life people have their normal lives appear like in Svolvar there's one example of many small towns or cities on our Nordic rim and also we know the countries you see the people live there and more and more people will live in the Arctic both because it is possible and secondly because there is something to do there and I think that it's again take away my search it's an area that illustrates both some of the serious challenges confronting the globe when it comes to global warming and its consequences it opens up for a set of opportunities they have to be managed because they will not manage themselves but they can be managed through good international cooperation which is why my government has put this on its very top of its foreign policy agenda to promote good cooperation good norms and good understanding of what's going on in the Arctic