New figures released by the Frontier Guard reveal that 8.6 million people crossed the international boundary over the last 12 months, marking the highest ever figure for the border and a traffic increase of 28 percent from the previous year.

The Nuijamaa and Imatra crossing points saw the biggest change, with border crossings up by 36 percent and 39 percent, respectively, in 2011. Similarly, the Vainikkala checkpoint saw 27 percent more international travellers; however, the temporary crossing at Parikkala saw 23 percent fewer crossings in the last year.

The figures released this week, which included crossings via Lappeenranta Airport as well as at port checkpoints in Lappeenranta and Nuijamaa, showed that 2011 saw 3,155,000 crossings at Vaalimaa and only 1,000 fewer at Nuijamaa.

December proved to be the busiest period for the border area in 2011, with 17th December being the busiest day of the year, with some 39,500 people moving through checkpoints between Russia and Finland on that day.

The Frontier Guard has said traffic has moved quickly in recent days but that crossing points are expected to remain busy throughout the week as a large number of Russians return home from shopping trips and holidays over the new year week.

The organisation hopes that the commercial hunting of the animals, a practice common in Greenland and Canada, will effectively be halted by the agreement.

The decision was made to protect sea mammals, with seal hunting categorised as a particularly harsh form of hunting. Russia is the biggest buyer of seal skins and whale calves skins, which are mainly supplied by Canada.

Maria Vorontsova, the director of the Moscow IFAW (International Fund for Animal Protection), said the ban was urgent due to the inhumane treatment of animals, particularly in Canada.

“Canadian seal hunters catch and kill [pups] under one year old, to be more exact, from 2 weeks to 3 months old,” Vorontsova told the Voice of Russia. “Thus, there’s reason to believe that seal hunting is cruel and inexpedient. Canada keeps saying that 90 percent of the seal skin market is in Russia.”

“And I’m very happy to say that Russia, which banned seal hunting in 2009, made another step and imposed a ban on the import of seal skins. Thus, the Union of Belarus, Kazakhstan and Russia, which have joined the countries, where a ban on the import of seal skins is in force, has made a very important step,” Vorontsova added.

A ban on the sale of seal products has also been approved by the European Parliament, although there will be exceptions for certain small indigenous communities in Russia, Greenland, Canada and Alaska. European visitors will still be able to purchase souvenirs made from the animal products as long as they are not for resale.

The deal with the Russian government was signed yesterday by Icelandic Minister for Foreign Affairs, Össur Skarphéðinsson.

According to the contract the Icelandic Food and Veterinary Authority will guarantee that Icelandic dairy producers adhere to Russian government standards. The contract means Icelandic producers will be able to export their goods to Russia, and also to Belarus and Kazakhstan; because the three countries recently entered into a free trade agreement with each other.

Össur Skarðhéðinsson said after signing the deal that the contract is similar to one made for the export of meat and fish last year, RÚV reports.

The meat and fish deal has apparently been useful and it is expected that the export of milk powder to Russia can begin soon. Össur said that the Russians’ nearest neigbours, the Finns, have fallen in love with Icelandic skyr and he hopes the important trade contract will cause Russians to get a taste for it as well.

Former billionaire Björgólfur used have large or controlling stakes in Landsbanki, West Ham United, Eimskip and XL Airways, among many others; but has since been declared bankrupt following the financial crash. He made his money initially in the Russian drinks business after the fall of Communism.

Now a former colleague says he was threatened and offered bribes by Björgólfur when a contested contract between the pair in St. Petersburg ended up in court. He accuses Björgólfur of having dishonestly appropriated property and an entire factory in Russia, RÚV reports.

The partnership between Ingimar Ingimarsson and Björgólfur Guðmundsson on the Russian soft drinks market began in the early 90s. Ingimar had started a company in Russia with Bernard Lardner, called Baltic Bottling. Baltic signed a deal to purchase equipment from Gosan, which Björgólfur indirectly controlled through his Pharmco company. Björgólfur Guðmundsson sat on the board at Baltic on behalf of Pharmco; although neither he nor other staff had shares in the factory. Business was tough at first, but things soon became much easier.

In September 1995 one of the executives at Baltic was unexpectedly barred entry to the factory by armed guards and told that a change of ownership had taken place. Björgólfur had said that Ingimar Ingimarsson had sold him his share in Baltic earlier that year with a signed contract which later became highly controversial in court. The sale price was said to be half-a-million dollars — which is itself noteworthy as the firm’s annual turnover was already as high as around USD 30 million.

The Baltic Bottling shareholders’ meeting in which the sale was approved, is said to have taken place on 29th September; but no representative of the seller was present. Russia’s register of companies approved the deed nevertheless and the factory came into Björgólfur Guðmundsson’s ownership.

The precise date of the shareholders’ meeting became a hot topic later in court. Ingimar and Bernard’s lawyers claimed that Björgólfur had himself not been in St. Petersburg on the day the meeting was alleged to have taken place, as he had been seen at a football match in London.

In his book on the affair, which was released yesterday, Ingimar tells of threats and bribery attempts on Björgólfur’s behalf, whereby he is alleged to have offered some two million dollars for Ingimar to stop the court case. He apparently refused the offers.

Ingimar and Bernard went on to win their case on three judicial levels; but Ingimar Ingimarsson did not manage to get his assets back when he tried to in 1997.

Ingimar says that at that time it came to light that all the assets he had been fighting for in Russian courts for a year-and-a-half had been transferred over to another company — a company called Bravo. The disputed assets in Baltic Bottling were, therefore, beyond his reach.

Ingimar Ingimarsson was interviewed about his damning new book last night on RÚV’s Kastljós current affairs news programme.

Bravo was set up in 1996 as a brewery, which was later sold to Heineken for USD 400 million. The remains of Baltic Bottling itself were sold to Pepsi at around the same time, according to Wikipedia.

According to Customs Crime Prevention Unit chief, Hannu Sinkkonen, the amount of contraband being transported could total thousands of kilogrammes.

Customs officials have managed to prevent nine cars carrying significant volumes of illegal substances crossing the border at Vaalimaa and Helsinki since the beginning of the year, according to reports. The amount of hashish seized is already more than was confiscated for the whole of last year. Other drugs ending up in the hands of customs officials include cocaine being transported from Central Europe.

At the end of 2010, officials seized cocaine estimated to be worth around EUR 3 million on the Russian market. The drugs apparently came from Bolivia and Paraguay and were being transported across Europe by a Russian drugs mule. The rise in the amount of drugs being taken into Russia is a reversal of the situation not long ago when substances were more commonly transported from the East into the West.

Finland’s customs said they believed there was now a desire in Russia for better quality product as the standard of living continues to rise and people more commonly desire to emulate Western habits.

According to Sinkkonen the preferred method of transport for the smugglers is a high-end car such as an Audi or a Mercedes. He speculated: “The idea must have been that the finer and more expensive the car, the higher the threshold would be for Customs officials to start taking down its structures.”

The conference is in Arkangelsk in Russia and as part of his visit, President Grimsson had a meeting yesterday afternoon with Prime Minister Putin. In the morning both had given speeches to conference delegates.

At the afternoon meeting Putin re-iterated Russia’s interest in increasing co-operation with Iceland in many areas, Visir.is reported. The slow opening of Arctic shipping routes is one area which calls for extensive co-operation and good Russia-Iceland relations will prove important to shippers. Strong international rules on safety and environmental protection will prove important and discussion has already begun about which ports will play important new roles.

In the meeting the two leaders also discussed Russia’s interest in geothermal energy co-operation, as well as the opportunities in the field for both countries elsewhere in the world. Russia’s energy minister, who was also present at the meeting, visited Iceland earlier in the year following another meeting between Grimsson and Putin in September 2010. His meetings at the time with energy companies, ministers and scientists have led to increasing Russian enthusiasm for geothermal energy projects in the Kamchatka region.

Both nations’ stakes in fisheries and sustainable use of ocean resources also came up for discussion — as did cultural matters.

Next year marks the 70th anniversary of formal diplomatic ties between Russia (then the USSR) and Iceland and the two leaders declared their interest in supporting cultural events in celebration. Vladimir Putin is apparently particularly enthusiastic to introduce Russians to the work of Icelandic painter Johannes Kjarval.

The parliaments of both countries signed off on the agreement on Tuesday. It will come into force on 7th July, allowing fresh deals with oil and gas companies in both nations, which are keen to explore the relatively untapped area.

“The potential economic benefits are enormous,” said James Nixey, manager and researcher for the Russia and Eurasia Programme from Chatham House. “The significance of the deal is that it is widely recognised that the Arctic is a scene of future commerce and possibly future conflict,” he added in a BBC report.

In 2008, the US Geological Survey concluded that 13 percent of the world’s recoverable, yet still un-found, oil and 30 percent of its gas could be in the Arctic.

“The expectation is that it has the potential to hold significant volumes of oil and gas because the area to the east of it has proven to be gas prone and the area to the west of it has proven to be gas prone,” said Julian Lee, a senior energy analyst at the Centre for Global Energy Studies.

He cautioned, however, that with so much of the Arctic still to be explored, it is possible that the estimates are wrong. “There is always a tendency to talk these things up because that is how you attract investment, but it’s probably far too early to say there are significant volumes of anything there until somebody looks for it,” Mr Lee told the BBC.

The region, which has become much more accessible in recent years due to ice melt caused by global warming, has been split into two equally-sized areas. It is believed that shipping companies running goods between Asia, Norway and Russia will benefit from the shorter routes that are opening up due to the melt.

2011 will see Russia begin to supply natural gas to Denmark upon the commencement of Nord Stream pipeline operations. In return, Copenhagen has said it will help Russia with implementing additional energy projects.

Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin visited Copenhagen last week to discuss a set of promising agreements with Lars Lokke Rasmussen and other Danish officials. His efforts proved to be successful as both countries appeared interested in a number of energy deals and expressed excitement over the Nord Stream project.
Mr Putin said: “The sea leg will be commissioned on 15 May. Everything is going on smoothly, and no environmental damage has been reported. In July we will start the supplies of technical gas, and European consumers, including those in Denmark, may expect first supplies of our gas in the autumn,” the Voice of Russia reports.

Among other initiatives, the two nations have agreed to invest in energy efficiency and innovation via a bi-national energy centre headed by both Denmark’s Danfoss and Russia’s Renova-Story Group.

The relationship between the two nations continues to grow after Denmark was the first nation to sign off on the Nord Stream pipeline. There are now some 200 Danish companies working in Russia, most of which are energy firms though there are also pharmaceutical and cancer research firms. Russia has invested substantially in Denmark’s pharmaceutical industry.

Writing in a text message to VG newspaper, Ms Amelie thanked all the people who had campaigned on her behalf and said, “I am very happy to return”. Her cause attracted widespread media attention and led to law changes which now allow illegal immigrants to apply for working visas in Norway.

“People who have been to Norway as asylum seekers can return as migrant workers, if they meet the immigration requirements for skilled workers, and have not violated Norwegian criminal law,” Deputy Minister at the Ministry of Justice, Paul Lonseth, said to NRK at the time.

Ms Amelie and her family applied for asylum in Norway in 2002 after fleeing Russia. She was rejected by the authorities, but continued living in the country illegally while obtaining a Master’s degree and releasing a book, ‘Illegally Norwegian’, about her plight.

She was arrested on 12th January this year and deported to Moscow, after which she moved to Krakow and lived under the protection of ICORN – an organisation which promotes freedom of speech for writers. According to The Foreigner, Maria Amelie will now be working for the Teknisk Ukeblad magazine in Norway.

Atomic facilities in Russia are a worry for Norway, which continues to screen its crops and livestock for radioactivity, nearly 25 years on from the Chernobyl disaster. Babies which were in the womb at the time of the catastrophe on April 26, 1986, were also found to have lower IQs when tested in their teenage years, according to a report on Norwegian news website The Foreigner.

“The distance between Norway and Russia’s St Petersburg nuclear power plant is approximately a third of the distance to Chernobyl. A serious incident there will clearly affect Norway,” said nuclear physicist Nils Bohmer from the Bellona Foundation. He added that reactors at the Russian plant “are identical with Chernobyl’s. They contain considerable amounts of graphite, something which contributed to turning the Chernobyl accident into a catastrophe.”

The country’s Kola nuclear station, which lies just 200km from the Norwegian border, is also a potential threat, according to Bohmer, as the service life of its four reactors has been extended several times over the last 30 years. He added that the reactors at this site also lack inner containment vessels. “They are consequently more vulnerable in critical situations, and [their location] gives Norwegian authorities a response-time of just two hours,” he said.

Speaking to Nordlys newspaper, Andrej Tsolotkov, from Bellona’s office in Murmansk, said the last week’s concerning events in Japan almost occurred in December 1991 in Kola when the cooling system at the plant failed. “It was the same possibly catastrophic process. They didn’t have diesel-driven generators [at Kola], and the crisis started developing after the wind knocked out the power,” he said.