20 May, 2017
A few hundred people chanted slogans and made speeches to protest the presence of U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson in Fairbanks, Alaska, on Wednesday, May 10, 2017.
Among the delegates present were representatives of Sweden, Finland, Russia, Iceland, Denmark, Norway, Canada and the United States - with State Secretary Rex Tillerson transferring the two-year rotating Arctic Council chairmanship to the Finnish FM Timo Soini.
That's raised concerns among the global crowd gathered in Fairbanks this week.
U.S. Deputy Assistant Secretary David Balton tried to square the circle this week in a call with reporters.
Andreassen said the document should provide some understanding of how the U.S.is approaching the Arctic. "I am very confident there will be no change in that regard", he said. They've probably done the most in the second and third areas.
The Obama administration had emphasized climate change and scientific research during the two-year USA chairmanship.
Were there any missed opportunities under the US chairmanship?
For Canada and Nordic countries deeply concerned about climate change, the Arctic Council meeting is a chance to lobby Tillerson at a moment when the US decision is at a "stalemate", said Andrew Light, a climate specialist with the World Resources Institute.
He'll be sharing his message to politicians and the public at a workshop lead by Arctic 21 Thursday.
All eight Arctic State Minister-level Representatives are set to review and authorize work achieved under the two-year U.S. Chairmanship, that aims to boost sustainable development and environmental protection in the polar region. "And I think that sounds reasonable to do so".
Lavrov also poured cold water on the ongoing firestorm in Washington over the allegations of Russian interference in the US presidential election, deriding that as fake news and calling it a "humiliating" scenario for the American people.
What will you be watching for on May 11th?
"The question of the US view of the Paris agreement is still under consideration within the USA government", David Balton, the State Department official in charge of USA participation in the Arctic Council, told reporters this week. So hopefully this ministerial will continue to underscore that the Arctic remains a very viable, and very crucial locus of cooperation, between the West and Russian Federation at a time when relations are souring in so many other venues.
Finland has made it clear that the climate will remain at the heart of the body's deliberations when it takes over the gavel later Thursday - but Washington's position is in limbo.
Murkowski outlined some of her policy priorities that she hopes to raise with Tillerson but, just as Sullivan did, left out any mention of climate change. On the website outlining their chairmanship priorities, they say they want to emphasize the implementation of the Paris Agreement on climate change in the first sentence, which is making a strong point from the get-go. Unlike places like the USA and Canada, Finland is not an Arctic coastal state so I think it kind of gets forgotten about. Already, Russia has announced it will begin shipping natural gas from an Arctic port in Siberia later this year, using special icebreaking tankers, and the Russian military recently completed a base on Franz Josef Land in the northern Barents Sea. High-level officials from the world's eight Arctic nations will meet in Alaska this week amid concerns about the future of the sensitive region after President Trump called for more oil drilling and development.
This story is posted on Independent Barents Observer as part of Eye on the Arctic, a collaborative partnership between public and private circumpolar media organizations.
