US Envoy: Barents Border Dispute An Energy Security Issue

Norway should resolve its decades-old Barents Sea border dispute with Russia as it’s a security of supply issue for the U.S., the new U.S. ambassador told Dow Jones Newswires late Thursday.

Disagreement between Moscow and Oslo about how to demarcate the border stretching into the Arctic sea has made the 173,000-square-kilometer disputed area – estimated to hold 12 billion barrels of oil equivalent – all but untouchable for exploration and development for the past 30 years.

“We see the border dispute…from an energy security perspective,” newly-appointed ambassador Benson Whitney said on the sidelines of a U.S. Chamber of Commerce event here. “We have an interest in it and would like to see it resolved.”
Schlumberger