Thomas Nilsen

Emergency shutdown at Kola reactor

An unexpected fault led to an automatic scram at reactor No. 3 on Sunday.
May 22, 2023

Atomflot added to U.S. sanctions list

FSUE Atomflot, the maintenance base for Russia’s fleet of nuclear-powered icebreakers, can no longer buy products from, or do business with, U.S. or European Union entities.
May 20, 2023

War games take up 150,000 km2 of the Barents Sea

15 navy ships, submarines and support vessels take part in the exercise. Navigation- and flight warnings are issued for a huge area along Russia’s maritime border with Norway.
May 20, 2023

Russia bans Greenpeace

Undesirable Organization: Greenpeace was until Friday the last international environmental organization not attacked by repressive authorities in Russia.
May 19, 2023

Bombers from Murmansk region led new wave of missile attacks on Kyiv

Eight of the ten strategic bombers launching cruise missiles on Ukraine overnight took off from the Olenya Air Base on the Kola Peninsula.
May 18, 2023

Murmansk’s population drops by 7,000 in a year

The brutal demographic figures for Russia’s Kola Peninsula continue sharp down. The population is nearly halved over the last three decades.
May 15, 2023

Military enlistment office in Murmansk set on fire

Regional media reports name a 19-year old young man breaking the window, starting fire by igniting flammable stuff on the night to Sunday.
May 14, 2023

Satellite image shows 16 strategic bombers deployed to Kola Peninsula

Packed to capacity: All aprons along the runway at Olenya Air Base are now occupied by Russia’s largest and heaviest combat aircraft, a satellite image from this week reveal.
May 13, 2023

The end is nearing for repair of Russian fishing boats in northern Norway

Planned maintains and repair are as a main rule no longer allowed, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs makes clear. In Finnmark, Police on Friday announced new onshore rules, limiting the areas of access in Kirkenes and Båtsfjord.
May 12, 2023

Barentsburg: "Everyone was told to stop posting opinions about the war"

"It was clearly said, either you work and don't speak out, or you'll be fired," tells Timofey Rogozhin, former head of the tourist arm of Russia's state-owned Aktikugol company at Svalbard.
May 11, 2023

Pages

Thomas Nilsen is editor of the Independent Barents Observer with its news desk located in Kirkenes, northern Norway. He has a long experience in media cooperation across the borders in the high north of Europe, both as radio- and newspaper reporter all the way back to the days before the breakup of the Soviet Union. 

Nilsen has been editor of Barents Observer since 2009.

He was Deputy Head of the Norwegian Barents Secretariat from 2004-2009. Until 2003, he worked 12 years for the Bellona Foundation’s Russian study group, focusing on nuclear safety issues and general environmental challenges in northern areas and the Arctic. 

Thomas has been traveling extensively across northern Scandinavia and Arctic Russia since the late 80’s working for different media and organizations. He is also a guide at sea and in remote locations in the Russian north for various groups and regularly lectures on security issues, environmental and socio-economic development.

Thomas Nilsen studied at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology.

Mobile: +47-90573143

thomas@thebarentsobserver.com
@nilsen.thomas