The Conference on the subject “The Northern Sea Route and the Basis of the Russian Federation’s State Policy in the field of infrastructure, shipbuilding, energy, digital development and international cooperation” was successfully conducted on October 29, 2020.
From the first minutes of the Conference the matters of the development of the NSR have turned the Conference into the discussion over the concrete applied mechanisms that will strengthen Russia’s position in the Arctic.
Nikolay Korchunov, Ambassador-at-Large for the Arctic Cooperation at the MFA of Russia and the Senior Official of the Russian Federation to the Arctic Council, has most fully described the international importance and the political prospective of the NSR. He stated that, by becoming the Chair of the Arctic Council, Russia will act like Iceland and will continue the work aimed on responsible administration of the Arctic.
“Mr. Korchunov said:”First of all, we plan, in the next two years, to pay attention to the matter of sustainable development as it is the only policy that combines the three following factors: social, economic and environmental; it doesn’t accumulate the environmental harm”. Moreover, Mr. Korchunov recalled that, for Russia, the Arctic region is, nowadays, the territory for implementation of the scientific and manufacturing facilities and the implementation of the technological progress.
N. Korchunov. Ambassador-at-Large, MFA of Russia / A Photo by TASS
The matter of the Arctic indigenous people has been discussed in detail by the Conference’s participants. Antonina Gorbunova, a Lawyer for the protection of the Russian native minorities’ rights, made the most interesting report on the subject.
She has expressed an opinion of the experts’ society by proposing an obligatory conduct of an ethnological expertise while deploying certain objects of the NSR: “As we see on the example of the recent fuel spill in Norilsk, the ethnological expertise shows itself as an effective instrument for establishing relations in complicated situations between the indigenous people, a State and corporations…”
A. Gorbunova, Lawyer for the protection of the Russian minorities’ rights / a photo by TASS
Antonina Gorbunova stated: “As it has been recently announced, the Russian President signed the Arctic Development Strategy. This is, indeed, a great success for Alexander Krutikov’s team. The strategy itself indicates a low level of availability of the Communication Infrastructure in the Russian Arctic. There’s a concept in the global society known as the Digital Gap. This year has shown us, in terms of the pandemic, how important the digital technologies and an access to them are for us. I mean the most vulnerable category of citizens: indigenous people who practice nomadic and half-nomadic lifestyle at the High North. Russia has successful practices like the IT Nomad Camp in the Khanty-Mansiisk Autonomous Region. The Yamalo-Nenets Autonomous District also did quite well in the sphere. This is not just an access to public services, to promptly informing the population who lives in remote and hard-to-reach places, an access to education and telemedicine. This is the key issue in the majority of aspects”.
