Another minister meeting i Kirkenes?
Norwegian Minister of Culture Trond Giske has invited his Russian colleague Alexander Avdeev to the Norwegian border town of Kirkenes in January next year, where they will take part in the Barents Spektakel culture festival.
This week Minister Giske met the Russian Minister of Culture, Alexander Avdeev, in Arkhangelsk, where cultural cooperation in the Barents Region was on the agenda. After the meetings the Norwegian Minister invited Avdeev to the Norwegian border town of Kirkenes during the Barents Spektakel cultural festival. This festival takes place in the end of January 2009.
Mr Avdeev said thank you for the invitation and said it would be a nice chance to get a better picture of what is happening on the cultural arena of the Barents Region. However, the minister could not give any answer to the invitation yet. He would have to check his program for the next year first. Mister Avdeev is one of the new Russian Ministers, who was appointed by President Dimitri Medvedjev in May. Among other thingsm, Avdeev has earlier been assigned as Russian Ambassador in France, a position which he got a lot of recognition for.
Kirkenes seems to be turning into the new venue for bilateral discussions between Russia and Norway. In the beginning of June the Foreign Ministers Jonas Gahr Støre of Norway and Sergey Lavrov of Russia met in Kirkenes. Now it seems like there is going to be another minister meeting in the small town next to the Norwegian-Russian border.
