Executive Summary: Russian officials have played up China’s interest in potentially investing in the Vostok Oil project, though significant challenges remain. The mega-project looks to enhance Moscow’s geopolitical ties with Asia, elevate the Northern Sea Route’s competitiveness with the Suez Canal, and promote economic growth.... MORE

In late December 2023, foreign investors for Russia’s Arctic LNG-2 project voiced their intentions to pull out from the initiative (Kommersant.ru, December 25, 2023). The development project on the Gydan Peninsula was designed to transform Russia into a central global exporter of liquid natural gas... MORE

Moscow continues to claim that it has more than fully compensated for its lost access to oil and natural gas markets in the West due to sanctions by expanding sales to China, India, and other countries in the East (Politicheskiy Kaleidoskop, January 1). A closer... MORE

Over the past five years, Moscow has made progress in gaining international recognition for its expansive claims to large portions of the Arctic. As some Russian media outlets reported in early December, this has come in part because the United States has not ratified the... MORE

Russians living in the Far North are fed up with the lack of basic living supplies from their local governments. This discontent may soon escalate to the federal level. Moscow must be able to supply population centers and military bases along the country’s northern border... MORE

Moscow has long declared that China’s role in the development of the Northern Sea Route (NSR) is a central part of their strategic cooperation (see EDM, July 23, 2020; March 28). Despite this, the Kremlin cannot be entirely comfortable with the recent extent of Beijing’s... MORE

Western sanctions and changes in climate are impelling Moscow to realize a dream dating back three centuries to the time of Tsar Peter the Great—an all-water route from the Barents Sea to the Pacific through Russia’s coastal Arctic waters. During a Kremlin video conference on... MORE

Over the past several years, Moscow has been remarkably successful in convincing the Faroe Islands and Greenland, two Danish dependencies, to adopt different and less hostile policies toward Russia than North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) member Denmark. Now, some in the Russian capital fear that... MORE

In March 2023, at his summit meeting in Moscow with Chinese President Xi Jinping, Russian President Vladimir Putin announced that he was ready to create a joint Chinese-Russian working group to develop what the Russians call the Northern Sea Route (NSR) and the Chinese the... MORE

In a development with enormous consequences both for international trade and for Moscow’s control of its far-flung regions across the country’s northern third—places not linked to the center by roads or railways—the Russian Federation is rapidly losing its historical dominance over the Northern Sea Route... MORE