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Topic: What's going on in Scandinavia, North Atlantic, Baltic States and Scotland? (Read 132595 times)

Re: What's going on in Scandinavia, North Atlantic, Baltic States and Scotland?

Reply #525
Yes, it must be a miracle, because the newspiece says they have not identified what the exact issue was. So they don't really know the cause.

Re: What's going on in Scandinavia, North Atlantic, Baltic States and Scotland?

Reply #526
The annual Södertälje Science Week is replaced with a livestream this year. Sad for us locals, but it also means that anyone can watch. These events are in English: https://sscp.se/scienceweek/english/

Re: What's going on in Scandinavia, North Atlantic, Baltic States and Scotland?

Reply #527
https://estonianworld.com/security/russia-puts-estonia-on-the-unfriendly-countries-list/
Quote
Russia puts Estonia on the “unfriendly” countries’ list

The Russian authorities have started compiling a list of countries that are deemed “unfriendly” towards it – and Estonia is one of them.

Re: What's going on in Scandinavia, North Atlantic, Baltic States and Scotland?

Reply #528
Interesting reading @ estoniaworld, and I was somewhat surprised that the article has garnered no comments this far...
进行 ...
"Humor is emotional chaos remembered in tranquility." - James Thurber
"Science is the belief in the ignorance of experts!" - Richard Feynman
 (iBook G4 - Panther | Mac mini i5 - El Capitan)

Re: What's going on in Scandinavia, North Atlantic, Baltic States and Scotland?

Reply #529
Estonianworld will never generate any comments. I know who Estonianworld is. Nobody wants anything to do with him.

Estonia (and pretty much all Russia's neighbouring countries) has all along been on a different list, the list of "close abroad countries". It's basically the post-USSR countries. With "close abroad countries" Russia's policy is that those countries should belong to Russia.

Re: What's going on in Scandinavia, North Atlantic, Baltic States and Scotland?

Reply #530
Not only Russia's Near Abroad. The Baltic Sea is kind of the EU Mare Nostrum.




Re: What's going on in Scandinavia, North Atlantic, Baltic States and Scotland?

Reply #531
Nobody wants anything to do with him.
I think it was Dorothy Parker who once said, "If you have nothing good to say about anybody, come sit next to me..." :)
进行 ...
"Humor is emotional chaos remembered in tranquility." - James Thurber
"Science is the belief in the ignorance of experts!" - Richard Feynman
 (iBook G4 - Panther | Mac mini i5 - El Capitan)


Re: What's going on in Scandinavia, North Atlantic, Baltic States and Scotland?

Reply #533
https://youtu.be/eM4otIAZIps
Cannot be done as long as the Baltic Sea remains under Nord Stream. Nord Stream means the EU gave the Baltic Sea away, possibly irrevocably, and nothing sustainable can be done there.

 

Re: What's going on in Scandinavia, North Atlantic, Baltic States and Scotland?

Reply #534
I am no great fan of the Nord Streams, the one that is built or the one that is practically built, but neither am I concerned about them. They pose no significant threat strategically, environmentally, or for the climate. Being built, they are no different from other fossil gas pipelines from Russia to the EU, like e.g. Yamal. Sure, it would not be great if the methane leaks, but if that happened in the Baltic Sea, it would not stay in the Baltic Sea, unlike most other things that happens to it.

It is for the most part effectively a shallow lake, with little circulation, a huge water catchment, and the Danish waterways as an easily blocked drain. 










Year of the Covid: Did Sweden succeed?

Reply #535
Spoiler alert: The short answer is - no.

[video]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0017zNe7obo[/video]


Re: What's going on in Scandinavia, North Atlantic, Baltic States and Scotland?

Reply #537
Local resident of Södertälje? Isn't Danderyd an even greater concentration of powerful people?

Re: What's going on in Scandinavia, North Atlantic, Baltic States and Scotland?

Reply #538
Yep, we are near the bottom of the socioeconomic spectrum, while Danderyd is on the top. Södertälje is a more gritty industrial/immigration town. But there is a dynamic to this place, I have high expectations for 2030. We might not rate very high on culture and music.


We do have a very tenuous Eurovision link though. Will Ferrell lives in the neighbouring municipality, while Greta Thunberg, the daughter of an opera singer and Eurovision contestant, went to school here.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7q6Co-nd0lM

There is a tradition for opera in Eurovision.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TxFXfg3HYuE





Re: What's going on in Scandinavia, North Atlantic, Baltic States and Scotland?

Reply #540
Thread on Baltic rail,

You ask your local government about that. The European routes themselves predate the EU, but the EU part-funds infrastructure projects through cohesion funds, and TEN-T road/rail/sea routes, including the North Sea–Baltic Corridor, are priority routes. But it is the member countries that actually build them (ot procure tenders).

Rail Baltica is different, in that it is managed by RB Rail AS, equally shared by the three Baltic rails. That isn't all that unusual for transnational projects, e.g. the Øresund Bridge is 50% owned each by Swedish and Danish state companies.  It is unusual in the degree of EU funding. Normally the EU funds maybe 20%, but with Rail Baltica the percentage is far higher. Indeed according to the this article Rail Baltica just got 90% of EU total extra funding. Not bad for three countries comprising 1.3% of the EU population. (5.6% of total CEF transport budget, plus whatever was the regular Rail Baltica funding, still pretty good).

1.56 billion of CEF funding to railways, Rail Baltica included



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=auoFY5sULM8

If the Estonian government doesn't want to fund a fairly small and cheap upgrade to the Pärnu branch, that indicates that they don't value it highly, not that they have been bamboozled by the EU.

Re: What's going on in Scandinavia, North Atlantic, Baltic States and Scotland?

Reply #541
So what is happening in those barely populated areas linked to the North Atlantic ocean?


The Arctic Council Ministerial Meeting has been going on in Reykjavik. Next time in Russia.

Arctic Council Adopts First-Ever Strategic Plan

Quote
During the Arctic Council Ministerial Meeting 2021 in Reykjavik, Iceland, the Council approved its first-ever strategic plan, which lays out a framework for the Council's work in the next decade.

With U.S. climate drama behind them, can the Arctic Council turn the page in Reykjavik?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bye_RXcuAKw

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I2aCVi4ekps




Re: What's going on in Scandinavia, North Atlantic, Baltic States and Scotland?

Reply #543
Some curious ad:

https://investinestonia.com/the-town-of-polva-will-get-estonias-smartest-road
Quote
“The smart road to be built in Põlva is Estonia’s first average speed measurement solution in an open environment,” said Mart Suurkask, the CEO of Bercman Technologies.

The new smart road section is about 2.7 km long with an average speed measurement capacity and includes 14 smart pedestrian crosswalks on Kesk and Jaama streets in Põlva. These pedestrian crosswalk solutions are equipped with number plate recognition cameras to measure the average speed of cars and have signs with changeable information at the start and endpoints of the smart road section.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kSKxRjxNn48

It shows an almost Canadian-style road design enhanced with a few "smart" things. By comparison, what it looks like in the Netherlands/Belgium:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bAxRYrpbnuA


Re: What's going on in Scandinavia, North Atlantic, Baltic States and Scotland?

Reply #545
The quintet of Nordic and Baltic countries at the top of the Index – Norway, Denmark, Sweden, Finland, and Estonia – continues to serve as a democratic model where freedom of expression flourishes, while Moldova (40th) and Bulgaria (91st) stand out this year thanks to government change and the hope it has brought for improvement in the situation for journalists even if oligarchs still own or control the media.

In the case of Estonia, once again emerging Europe’s leader on the index and the only country in the region where the press freedom situation is considered “good”, the report says that “the political environment [in Estonia] has been characterised by a relative neutrality towards journalism and few verbal attacks, which has contributed to journalists being able to hold politicians accountable without fear of persecution.”
Relative neutrality and few verbal attacks? Actually, we just had a Trump-emulating party in the government that was fairly vocal a la "mainstream media is always lying".

And the court system has decided that journalism needs to be restricted. Yesterday a court issued a fine to journalists who reported on the latest charges against Swedbank. The fine was requested by the prosecutor as the journalists for disobeying the prosecutor's guidelines on some specific information that should be withheld.

According to the journalists, there has been no rule about obeying the prosecutor to withhold some information when covering active court cases. Instead there has been coordination to avoid mistaken information. In this fine order by the court, there is no accusation of having published false information. There is the accusation of following "vain curiosity" and not public interest. To support the accusation, the order refers to von Hannover vs Germany which is about publishing half-nude pics of Princess of Hanover in a tabloid, i.e. a paparazzi incident, not too easily comparable to a money-laundering scandal.

There are no details available regarding what in particular constituted "vain curiosity" by the journalists, because exactly those details are withheld by the prosecutor to protect the proceedings of the money laundering case. So, either journalists themselves don't know the details or cannot report on the details they got the fine for.

Lithuania (ninth), Czechia (20th), Latvia (22nd), Slovakia (27th), Moldova (40th), and Croatia (48th) are rated as “satisfactory”, with press freedom considered “problematic” in Armenia (51st), Slovenia (54th), Romania (56th), North Macedonia (57th), Kosovo (61st), Montenegro (63rd), Poland (66th), Bosnia and Herzegovina (67th), Kyrgyzstan (72nd), Serbia (79th), Hungary (85th), Georgia (89th), Bulgaria (91st), Albania (103rd), and Ukraine (106th).

https://rsf.org/fr/classement

Re: What's going on in Scandinavia, North Atlantic, Baltic States and Scotland?

Reply #546
Sauli Niinistö (President of Finland) had a chat with Putin and apologetically informed him that Finland would join Nato. Putin said that there's no threat to Finland's security, so it's an erroneous move to join Nato https://yle.fi/uutiset/3-12446090

In other news, last night Russia stopped exporting electricity to Finland, cutting off 10% of Finland's energy https://yle.fi/uutiset/3-12445766

Anyway, it's Eurovision finals tonight, without Russia https://eurovision.tv/story/eurovision-2022-how-to-watch

Re: What's going on in Scandinavia, North Atlantic, Baltic States and Scotland?

Reply #547
These are oligarchs by themselves, not agents in somebody else's pocket.
Someone like Musk does have massive business interests in China. I'd imagine he wouldn't want to rock the boat too much if he can help it.
Sure. Being an oligarch does not necessarily mean being completely sovereign, even though some oligarchs imagine themselves to be such. Musk (and more so Murdoch) is a businessman, some moves a are bad for his business so he either does not do those moves or attempts to undo them when he discovers it was a mistake.

Ever since Berlusconi pocketed enough telemedia he thinks he is invulnerable, which is quite justified thinking on his part, because he has really been through everything basically unscathed, retaining all the liberties and access to power, and is now 86 years old, i.e. a life lived merrily and still ongoing.

In contrast, all Russian oligarchs are Putin's vassals who must sacrifice own wealth for him when the time is at hand, which is right now. The most sovereign oligarch is Putin himself. Schröder is a well-paid foreign agent, not some unwitting useful idiot. Schröder's case qualifies for treason 100%.

Question is, does Musk do Putin's bidding, or does Putin do Musk's bidding?

Things keep happening to Starlink competitors like underseas communication cables.



Damaged cable leaves Shetland cut off from mainland






[/b]

Re: What's going on in Scandinavia, North Atlantic, Baltic States and Scotland?

Reply #548
University of Tromsø, Norway snagged themselves a Brazilian researcher on hybrid threats. He is not working there anymore.

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1585988275814428672


Norway’s Russian spy scandal should be a warning to all universities
Quote
Until last month, not many people were aware of the political warfare programme at Norway’s Arctic University in the northern city of Tromsø. But then, officers at the Norwegian Police Security Service arrested one of the researchers, claiming he was a Russian spy.

There is a striking irony in the fact that Moscow may have successfully infiltrated the very programme that investigates so-called “greyzone” activity — subversive actions by hostile states that fall below the threshold of formal conflict. But this arrest should also serve as a warning for academics across the world, whose work across borders and collaborative instincts make them particularly vulnerable at a time of rising geopolitical tensions.

José Assis Giammaria, purportedly a Brazilian citizen who has a masters degree in strategic studies from the University of Calgary, had specifically requested to work on the greyzone programme. It is also likely that he was interested in Tromsø as a centre of research on the High North, an increasingly contested region on Russia’s doorstep where melting Arctic ice is opening new sea routes and allowing access to rare minerals.

Giammaria gained a position in much the same way academics usually find employment: he was recommended to Gunhild Hoogensen Gjørv, professor of security studies who leads the greyzone programme, by colleagues in Canada. She scrutinised his references and his University of Calgary credentials, which all seemed entirely in order.

“He got a lot of praise when I checked references,” Gjørv told Norwegian media. “He expressed an interest in the security policy situation in the north”. She described him as a quiet and slightly shy man who did not share much information about himself. Now Giammaria is being held by Norwegian security services, who say he’s a Russian illegal — a spy operating under deep cover, rather than posing as a diplomat. The investigative network Bellingcat has already alleged that he is actually Colonel Mikhail Mikhushin of the GRU, Russia’s foreign intelligence service. He has denied all the accusations against him.

Norwegian media followed the tracks of a Russian spy to Lithuania: it turned out that he studied in Vilnius

Quote
A Twitter photo from the Mykolas Romeri University shows one of the suspected spies with his colleague Marc Lanteigne, an associate professor at the Arctic University of Norway. It was the two of them who came from Tromsø and were supposed to represent the university.

The conference on hybrid threats took place on September 29 and 30 in Vilnius. The suspected spy was trained to find weaknesses in hybrid threats such as pipeline sabotage. The EU-Hybnet conference project is financed by the EU.

Among the main objectives of the conference was to find out what to do if the country’s gas pipelines are blown up or the entire electricity grid is paralyzed. The lawyer of the suspected spy, Thomas Hansen, told the daily “VG” that the suspect is in shock and does not understand the accusations against him.

Re: What's going on in Scandinavia, North Atlantic, Baltic States and Scotland?

Reply #549
Tartu is sending some propaganda out into the world about becoming the "capital of self-driving vehicles".

https://e-estonia.com/tartu-aims-to-become-the-european-capital-of-self-driving-vehicles/
Quote
To start with, Tartu decided to experiment with on-demand transport in the region. Organising a regular bus route in its sparsely populated surroundings is unreasonable. But according to Tambet Matiisen, Head of Technology at the ADL, this challenge was a perfect opportunity for self-driving cars: it is often easier to achieve driverless mobility on smaller highways than in dense urban settings. Combining these considerations, and with the participation of several technology companies, Tartu ran a widely popular experiment between 26 on-demand stops connected by 66 km of roads.

This pilot provided both the city and other participants with valuable information about future challenges before such a transport system could be applied more widely. Mr Matiisen recalls, for example, how they quickly realised that using traffic lights for navigation is suboptimal.

Something like 24-hour buses could certainly be a very good thing in theory.