In March, after the beginning of the Russian special military operation in Ukraine, Canada, Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway, Sweden and the United States announced that they would not participate in the meetings of the Arctic Council held under Russian chairmanship. In June the seven countries agreed to partially renew their participation in the projects Russia is not involved in.
"We emphasized the fact that projects presented by Russia will be carried out by Russia regardless of the lack of partners for the projects at the moment, mainly using our own resources," Korchunov told a press conference hosted by the Rossiya Segodnya media agency in Moscow.
The envoy called it "disappointing" that Russia's projects with other countries within the Arctic Council were being blocked, as each project undergoes a long process of coordination and fund-raising before being launched.
Regarding the newly adopted US national strategy for the Arctic, Korchunov said that Moscow was concerned with the fact that the United States made confrontation with and deterrence of other countries a cornerstone of the document.
"As one of the main challenges I would name the possible fragmentation of cooperation in the Arctic region " the envoy said, adding that "Since now those, who participate in international cooperation and shaping the creation of the Arctic as a common Home, in which people of the Arctic, indigenous peoples live in harmony… This implies constructive cooperation of all the Arctic states, for sure, this raises many questions."
17 October 2022, 14:02 GMT
In early October the United States adopted its National Strategy for the Arctic Region for the next ten years. According to the document, Washington intents to effectively compete with Russia and China, as well as to cooperate with Finland and Sweden in the security area.