Norway has suspended all political contact with Moscow and has canceled a previously planned joint military exercise with Russia because of the conflict in Ukraine, the Norwegian prime minister said.
Norway’s Prime Minister Erna Solberg talking with her Ukrainian counterpart Arseniy Yatsenyuk during a meeting in Kiev, Nov. 18.
The only interactions that remain between the two countries are „local-level contacts” related to maritime transport and fishing, Norway’s Prime Minister Erna Solberg said in an interview with Ukraine’s Gazeta.zn.ua news site published Friday.
„There had been no problems in our cooperation during the past 10 years,” she was quoted as saying. „But now because of the illegal annexation in Crimea and the Russian activities in the eastern Ukrainian regions, we have frozen all political contacts with Moscow.”
Russia annexed Crimea from Ukraine this spring, in a move that Kiev and Western nations have denounced as illegal, and it continues to back pro-Moscow separatists in Ukraine’s east.
Ukraine and the West have also accused Russia of supplying militants with fighters and weapons, though Moscow says all the Russian fighters in eastern Ukraine are acting as „volunteers.”
Solberg told Gazeta.zn.ua that Norway would be recalling its military experts „who were working with Russia on strengthening trust,” and has canceled joint war games that had been planned between the two countries.
„All of this is because of the situation in Ukraine,” she said….
http://www.themoscowtimes.com/article/norway-suspends-political-contact-with-russia-prime-minister-says/511712.html
