On February 1, Russian Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin signed a decree approving the launch of six major state-supported investment projects in the Arctic region. According to the document, Russia expects to attract more than 200 billion rubles (approximately $2.7 billion) in outside investments to complete... MORE

Russian efforts to control the Northern Sea Route and to secure exclusive access to the local seabed, from which it hopes to pump oil and natural gas as well as mine coal and other minerals for export, have been attracting increasing attention for years (see... MORE

Vladimir Putin’s much-ballyhooed plans to project power in the Arctic have attracted widespread notice and sparked serious concerns in many countries, with some like the US committing themselves to building up an icebreaker fleet to be able to challenge Russia in that strategically important region... MORE

On January 1, 2021, Russia’s Northern Fleet was officially upgraded to the status of a Military District (MD), as part of a reorganization of the overall system of MDs. This marks a significant change to the national organizational structure of the MDs in Russia; and... MORE

On October 26, President Vladimir Putin formally adopted the “Strategy for the Development of the Russian Arctic Zone and Provision of National Security Through 2035,” which aims to implement a “region-specific approach” for dealing with problems facing the country’s vast, strategically important, yet increasingly problematic... MORE

On October 22, Rosneft’s CEO, Igor Sechin, revealed some new, previously unpublished details regarding the state-owned Russian petroleum giant’s latest mega-project in the Arctic—Vostok Oil. Specifically, Sechin confirmed that Vostok Oil will include a natural gas liquefaction plant, which will ultimately enable Rosneft to ship... MORE

On October 26, President Vladimir Putin formally adopted the “Strategy for the Development of the Russian Arctic Zone and Provision of National Security Through 2035” (Pravo.gov.ru, October 26). The document is to be implemented in three stages: 2020–2024, 2025–2030 and 2031–2035. In a related comment,... MORE

President Vladimir Putin’s promotion of the Northern Sea Route (NSR) and Russian development of the seabed of the Arctic Ocean and adjoining parts of the Russian Federation were intended to excite and unify Russians at a difficult socio-economic time (see EDM, October 20). But things... MORE

Global warming—which left the Northern Sea Route ice-free this year for longer than at any point in recorded history (Barents Observer, October 7)—is prompting Moscow to devote ever more attention to security issues in that region relative to trade along a route Russia has traditionally... MORE

The poisoning of Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny caused an uproar in the international community, even leading to debates inside Germany about whether to punish Moscow by canceling the Nord Stream Two natural gas pipeline (see EDM, September 21). While the fate of Gazprom’s multi-billion-dollar... MORE