OREANDA-NEWS. June 08, 2011. Sergey Lavrov, Russian Minister of Foreign Affairs, held talks in Oslo with Jonas Gahr Store, Norwegian Minister of Foreign Affairs, on June 7.

The Ministers of Foreign Affairs of Russia and Norway exchanged the instruments of ratification for the Treaty on Maritime Delimitation and Cooperation in the Barents Sea and the Arctic Ocean. In the context of the upcoming realization of the Treaty, they discussed a number of practical issues related to the orderly launch of cooperation mechanisms in the fisheries and energy sectors.

More broadly, the issues of the Russian-Norwegian strategic energy partnership and of deepening cooperation in other important areas were discussed – including environmental protection, nuclear and radiation safety, and education. An exchange of views took place on ways to strengthen our cooperation in the Svalbard archipelago. Traditionally, a lot of attention was paid to issues of cooperation in the Russian-Norwegian border area.

The discussion also touched on themes relating to the interaction between Russia and Norway in regional formats – the Arctic Council and the Barents Euro-Arctic Council – along with exchanging views on topical international questions, with emphasis on security issues in the Euro-Atlantic space, cooperation under the auspices of the Russia-NATO Council, the theme of EuroPRO, as well as a number of regional subjects.

At a presentation ceremony held after the talks, Oyvind Nordsletten, Norway’s former ambassador to Russia was presented with the Order of Friendship for his considerable contribution to the development and strengthening of Russian-Norwegian relations.