Ratification of Barents Sea border deal postponed

Last week, BarentsObserver reported that the ratification of the important ocean border deal between Norway and Russia in the north was announced to be submitted to the plenum of the Norwegian Parliament on December 13th and then ready for ratification on the 16th.

The border deal was supposed to be ratified simultaneously in both the Norwegian and the Russian Parliament.

Today, the Tromsø-based newspaper Nordlys reports that the Norwegian Parliament needs more time before the treaty can be ratified.

Other sources say that also the Russian Duma for practical reasons can’t ratify the Treaty before after New Year some time.

- We have all realized that we need more time for the handling of this case than we first thought, says MP Ivar Kristiansen in the interview with Nordlys.

- As I see it we must conduct a hearing so that all affected can have their say, says Ivar Kristiansen. He chairs the handling of the treaty in the Parliament’s Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs and Defence.

Member of Parliament Ivar Kristiansen sees no drama in the delay.

A new date for ratification is not yet set, but the Parliament’s Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs and Defence now says they will submit their recommendation to the plenum in the Parliament on February 2nd, according to the schedule posted on the Parliament’s web-portal. The scedule was updated Wednesday this week.

- We intend to synchronize the ratification of the Barents Sea delimitation deal, said the Russian President Dmitri Medvedev at the press-conference following the signing of the delimitation agreement in Murmansk in September this year.

At the same press-conference, the Norwegian Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg underlined that he hoped the Norwegian Parliament “will ratify the deal before New Year.”

Read also: Norway and Russia sign maritime delimitation agreement

The treaty establishes the boundary between Norway and Russia in the Barents Sea and the Arctic Ocean. It increases the level of legal clarity and predictability in this area.

The treaty also contains provisions that ensure the continuation of the extensive and fruitful Norwegian-Russian fisheries cooperation, as well as provisions concerning cooperation on the exploitation of any petroleum deposits that extend across the delimitation line.

The signing of the treaty means that what for several decades remained the most important outstanding issue between Norway and Russia has now been resolved. The treaty marks the end of a long process that started in 1970.

The breakthrough in the negotiations was made public during President Medvedev’s visit to Norway on April 27th this year, when the Norwegian and Russian foreign ministers signed a joint statement announcing that the two countries’ negotiating delegations had reached preliminary agreement on delimitation.

Read the text of the treaty from this link at the web-portal of the Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs.