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Norway plans five-year 75 billion kroner aid package to Ukraine

Norway's government said Monday it was planning a five-year aid package to Ukraine worth 75 billion kroner ($7.3 billion), as well as additional aid to other countries affected by the conflict.

Published: 6 February 2023 12:16 CET

Pictured is Jonas Gahr Støre

Norway has announced a 75 billion kroner aid package for Ukraine. Norway's Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Store (C) is seen during a visit at the Kongsberg Defence & Aerospace weapons factory in Kongsberg, Norway on January 30, 2023. (Photo by Petter BERNTSEN / AFP)

“We are proposing that Norway gives a binding and lasting contribution to Ukraine”, Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Store told reporters.

“We are proposing that 15 billion kroner be given per year to Ukraine for five years, or 75 billion kroner”, he added, after presenting the details of the plan to opposition leaders.

The package is expected to cover humanitarian and military aid to Ukraine and will be divided equally between the two for this year. The final amount of the package may however be changed by parliament, where the centre-left government does not have a majority and relies on the backing of other parties to pass legislation.

Store also proposed a five-billion-kroner increase in aid “to countries in the (Global) South most affected by the war in Ukraine”, due primarily to the
rising cost of food and commodities.

The Norwegian government was harshly criticised last year for reducing its 2023 development aid budget even though the country saw gas revenue soar due to the war in Ukraine.

In 2022, Norway surpassed Russia as Europe’s biggest gas supplier, as
prices skyrocketed to record levels.

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Norway's high court confirms Norwegian control of Arctic resources

The case sets a precedent with major potential repercussions. The 15 judges of the Supreme Court unanimously rejected a lawsuit brought by the Latvian fishing company SIA North STAR, which had demanded the right to fish for snow crab on the continental shelf around Svalbard.

At the heart of the dispute are different interpretations of the Spitsbergen Treaty, the 1920 legal document governing the Svalbard archipelago. Beyond the question of snow crab — considered a delicacy in Asia — the case was seen as an important test to determine who would control other lucrative resources thought to lie beneath the continental shelf, like oil and gas or minerals.

Norway has long insisted it has exclusive rights. The Spitsbergen Treaty recognises “the full and absolute sovereignty of Norway” over Svalbard, but also allows nationals from other signatory countries to “enjoy equally the rights of fishing and hunting in the territories”.

As a result, Russia is able to maintain a mining community in the archipelago, located halfway between Europe’s mainland and the North Pole, in a region its Northern Fleet transits en route to the Atlantic.

But the wording of the treaty limits its geographic scope to the archipelago’s land and “territorial waters” — a concept that today denotes a maritime zone of 12 nautical miles but which was not specifically defined in 1920.

Treaty interpretation

According to SIA North STAR, the spirit of the treaty indicates that equal rights should apply to the entire continental shelf, a much wider zone, and a concept that also did not exist legally when the treaty was drawn up.

The Supreme Court found in favour of the Norwegian state, ruling that the wording of the treaty could not be subjected to an “extensible interpretation”.

“There has been no development in international law which would result in the notion of ‘territorial waters’ today including areas beyond territorial waters,” it wrote in its verdict.

Contrary to most other treaty signatories — more than 40 states, including Latvia, France, Russia, the United Kingdom and the United States — Norway is almost the only one that uses a restrictive interpretation of the treaty. The issue has never been brought before an international court.

“We are disappointed but we are not really surprised by the verdict, this case has a lot of legal and political aspects,” the lawyer for the Latvian company, Hallvard Ostgard, told AFP.

He said he would like to see the case brought before the International Court of Justice, which only reviews cases brought by states. The Norwegian state said it was “satisfied” with the ruling.

“It’s an important national clarification for a question that has been raised on several occasions in Norwegian courts,” Foreign Minister Anniken Huitfeldt told AFP.

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