Thomas Nilsen

Possible first coronavirus in Murmansk, hotel shuts down

Hotel Meridian on the central square in Murmansk is closed after a preliminary test from one participant in a chess tournament was positive for coronavirus.
March 16, 2020

All visitors have to leave Svalbard

Longyearbyen is a small and vulnerable society. We only have a small hospital with limited public health services, the local authorities states.
March 15, 2020

Norway introduces entry control at northern land border to Finland

Coronavirus: Only people with a working or living permit in Norway or another valid reason will be allowed to enter any of the northern cross-border roads from Finland from 8 am Monday morning.
March 15, 2020

Tromsø and northern municipalities impose quarantine restrictions on travelers from southern Norway

Efforts to slow down the spread of coronavirus escalate with drastic measures across Norway. All people from southern Norway arriving in Lofoten, Vesterålen, Kirkenes, and Tromsø must go directly into a 2-weeks quarantine.
March 15, 2020

Svedahl from Murmansk to Kyiv

Norway’s Consul General in Murmansk, Erik Svedahl, is appointed Ambassador to Ukraine.
March 14, 2020

Third interception of warplanes in a week

A pair of Russian supersonic Tu-160 strategic bombers flew over the Barents, Norwegian and North Sea to south of Great Britain on Thursday. Another aircraft stayed circling in the air west of Norway’s air base in Bodø.
March 13, 2020

Norway’s krone plummeting to new low, stock market down 9%

Coronavirus and a sharp dip in oil price are earth quaking the Norwegian economy. Thursday became all time single-day bad.
March 12, 2020

Russian submarine hunters on record long mission in north Atlantic

A pair of Northern Fleet Tu-142s has for the fourth time in just over two weeks been on mission outside Norway. The flight on Wednesday went all south to the Bay of Biscay.
March 12, 2020

Second track on railway to Murmansk gets extra funding

The double-track rail line from Olenegorsk to Murmansk is aimed at boosting Russia’s export via the port to the Barents Sea and will be ready by the end of 2022.
March 11, 2020

Norway cancels Cold Response due to coronavirus outbreak

More than 15,000 soldiers from nine countries will put down their weapons and start preparing to go home from their current locations in northern Norway.
March 11, 2020

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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