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Appendix ICONFERENCE OF PARLIAMENTARIANS OF THE ARCTIC REGION THE STANDING COMMITTEE OF PARLIAMENTARIANS OF THE ARCTIC REGION MEETING IN ILULISSAT 27 MAY 2009 Venue: Hotel Arctic, Ilulissat Time: 09.00
Draft minutes 1. ADOPTION OF THE AGENDA AND THE PROPOSED ORDER OF AGENDA ITEMS APPROVAL OF DRAFT MINUTES FROM THE SCPAR-MEETING IN BRUSSELS 25 FEBRUARY 2009 The Chair informed the Committee of two changes in the agenda. Agenda item 3 and 6 will be removed as the speakers were not able to attend the meeting. Decision: The Committee adopted the agenda and the proposed order of agenda items with the changes presented by the Chair, approved the minutes from the SCPAR-meeting in Brussels 25 February 2009, and took note of the report from the First Northern Dimension Parliamentary Forum. 2. REPORT FROM THE ARCTIC COUNCIL MINISTERIAL MEETING IN TROMSØ AND PRESENTATION OF THE PROGRAM OF THE DANISH CHAIRMANSHIP OF THE ARCTIC COUNCIL Ms Solberg informed the Committee about her speech at the AC-meeting focusing on the need for more political involvement in the Arctic Council and more frequent ministerial meetings. She also informed the Committee of the seminar on climate change hosted by Mr. Støre and Mr. Gore. Mr. Inuuteq Holm Olsen, Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs, Greenland Home Rule Government, presented the program for the Danish chairmanship (Denmark, Greenland and the Faroe Islands) of the Arctic Council. The peoples of the Arctic will be a priority during the chairmanship. This includes addressing environmental protection, human health, and sustainable use of resources as well as serving societal needs relating to environmental, social, economic and cultural development. Climate change will also be a major focus of the chairmanship. An Arctic Council project dealing with Snow, Water, Ice, and Permafrost in the Arctic will be finalized in 2011, but a preliminary report on the Greenland Ice sheet will be presented as an Arctic Council contribution to the 15th Conference of the Parties to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change in Copenhagen in December of this year. The International Polar Year, which started in 2007, has just been concluded. The Chairmanship will work to secure the legacy of the IPY – not only to further strengthening of data collection and scientific cooperation, but also to enable scientists, policy makers and indigenous peoples in the Arctic to continue to work together to address and understand the issues that are of importance to our lives and environment. The active participation and involvement in the decision-making process of the peoples that are being affected by the decisions is important. Therefore the peoples of the Arctic will retain a prominent role during the chairmanship. Greenland will as chair of the sustainable development working group focus on human health. The state of health especially among indigenous peoples in the Arctic is an issue that needs to be addressed through increased cooperation. The life expectancy among peoples in the Arctic are in many places way below national averages due to the change in lifestyles, which have resulted in increasing obesity, in diabetes, and cancer. There is also a very high suicide rates primarily among the young people. The chairmanship will work to strengthen the cooperation in research, monitoring and capacity building activities among others through the newly established Arctic Human Health Expert Group comprised of health professionals from all the Arctic countries. With the increased maritime traffic in the region, there is a corresponding need to be able to respond to emergencies and disasters. Dealing with issues like Search and Rescue and emergency response becomes vital in the future maritime traffic as the ice recedes. The chairmanship will continue to support operational cooperation between the Arctic states on preparedness and prevention, and work within existing frameworks and International Maritime Organization to make regulations for shipping in the Arctic mandatory. Such regulations will address issues like ship safety, requirements for ship construction, equipment, training and pollution prevention. 2010 is the International Year of Biodiversity. The Arctic Council will produce an Arctic Highlight Report in 2010, which is hoped to be an important contribution to the International Biodiversity Year. In light of the climatic changes taking place with regard to biodiversity, it becomes important to secure long term monitoring that will provide us with valuable information on status and trends. Full attention will be given to secure and facilitate implementation of the Arctic Council’s Circumpolar Biodiversity Monitoring Program. The increased interest is fuelled by the opportunities and challenges of climate change as well as potentially undiscovered reserves of oil and gas and minerals. The Arctic Council must safeguard the interest of the indigenous peoples, and respond to these new challenges the increased international interest sparks. Securing that the Arctic Council, its permanent participants and member states remains the regional body working for the interest of its nations and peoples will be of utmost importance during the chairmanship. Those who wish to engage the Council in closer cooperation will have to respect the roots and help promote sustainable development for the peoples of the Arctic, rather than creating obstacles to the cultural and economic survival. There was a general understanding in the Committee that the chairmanship program is promising and looks good. The focus on people and the human dimension is important. There was a discussion about the role of the Arctic Council. The Arctic Council needs to be strengthened and should be the leading regional body for cooperation in the North. But one should also to realize the limitations of the Arctic Council. An issue like self-determination is not as such a topic for the Arctic Council. The Danish chairmanship will continue to work on how the observers shall be included in the cooperation. Some members of the Committee pointed at the need to be an open organisation and involve non-Arctic actors in the work of the Council. Other members pointed at the big natural resources in the Arctic and underlined that the Arctic states must take the lead in the development and take the main responsibility for a sustainable development of the Arctic region. We need to involve the observers to exchange information. A strengthened Arctic Council is important when the interest from the outside world is increasing. The importance of close cooperation with the parliamentarians was underlined, and Mr. Niels Sindal informed the Committee of that the Foreign minister from Denmark wants to meet with the parliamentarians to discuss Arctic matters. The chairmanship program was developed in close cooperation between Denmark and Greenland. This will also be the situation when executing the program. A special effort will be made to over look all the reports produced by the Arctic Council and figure out what we know and where there are possible gaps of knowledge. An important feature of the Arctic Council is that its work is based on scientific reports. This will and must continue. Finally there will be an Arctic message at the COP 15 as Denmark is having the chairmanship of the Arctic Council and host of the conference. A report on Greenlandic ice cap will be presented, and there will be other Arctic side events as well. Decision: The Committee took note of the information. 3. ARCTIC MARINE SHIPPING ASSESSMENT – FINAL REPORT AND FINDINGS The item was taken off the agenda 4. GREENLANDIC HOME-RULE ON THE BASIS ON THE NEW AGREEMENT Ms Juliane Henningsen presented the new agreement between Denmark and Greenland on self rule for Greenland. Ms Henningsen welcomed the Committee to her hometown, Ilulissat and started by informing the Committee on the upcoming elections in Greenland the 2 June. Her party, Inuit Ataqatigiit, is doing well in the polls. The Denmark-Greenland self rule commission reached an agreement last year and the agreement was adopted in a referendum 25 November 2008. The people in Greenland voted overwhelmingly in favour to go from home-rule to self-rule. Almost 72 percent of the electorate voted. 75.5 percent of the electorate voted ’yes’. The agreement will enter into force 21 June 2009, and has broad support in both Denmark and Greenland. Ms. Henningsen paid tribute to the Danish contribution to find a new agreement which entails that Greenland can take over another 30 fields of responsibility. When Greenland assumes responsibility of an area they have to finance it themselves. This will create better accordance between rights and obligations. The sharing of revenues from natural resources between Denmark and Greenland has been settled. Greenland will receive the first 75 million DKK from any revenues from mineral resources. Then the revenues will be shared between Denmark and Greenland until Greenland has paid off half of the annual block grant of 3.2 billion Greenland receives from Denmark. The new agreement also include wording on future full independence for Greenland. Greenlandic will be the official language and the Greenlandic people will be accepted as a people under international law. The great challenge will now will be how they want to form the future Greenlandic society with the new freedom to manage their own affairs. Members of the Committee congratulated Greenland and Denmark for reaching an agreement. A question was raised to know what the language situation in schools will be after the 21 June. Greenlandic will be the basic language in elementary schools, but Danish, English and Greenlandic will all be present in the higher education system. The Committee wanted more information about exploration of the natural resources. About 70 exploration licenses have been given and 3-5 new mines are planned to open. The process has slowed down because of the financial crises. Alcoa is negotiating to open an aluminium smelter North of Nuuk with Greenlandic authorities. Oil licences has been issued and they will start test drilling next summer just outside Disco bay. There is also a debate in Greenland if they are to exploit uranium. Ms Juliane Henningsen confirmed that full independence from Denmark is a long term political goal for her party. Decision: The Committee took note of the information. 5. INTRODUCTION TO THE UNIVERSITY OF GREENLAND Ms. Tine Pars, Rector of the University of Greenland informed the Committee about current status and future plans for the university. Established in 1984 the University of Greenland has 120 employees, 9 institutes and a budget of 110 million DKK from the Greenlandic government. The money is mainly spent on teaching, not research. The university offers education in teaching, social work, nursing, journalism, culture and sociology, language, literature and media, theology, and administration. Since 1996 the university has produced 50 academic candidates (master), 3, 8 yearly, and 115 bachelors, 8, 8 yearly, which is too little. It is a big challenge to get the students through university. Ms Pars wish to establish masters’ degrees in law, economy and pedagogic psychology. She wants to improve the cooperation with other universities outside of Greenland. The cooperation with universities in Denmark is good, with exchange of teachers and students. Members of the Committee noted that the University is not a member of the University of the Arctic. Ms Pars expects closer cooperation with UArctic in the future. On question from the Committee Ms Pars informed that there are about 400 students at the University and that there are no formal agreements with any universities outside of Denmark. She underlined the need for more internationalisation. It is not a problem to get EU-grants even though Greenland is not a member of the EU. The University is exploring the possibilities to get more financial support from EU. So far the University hasn’t looked for financial support and cooperation with private companies, as the focus has been on keeping an independent university. The teaching of languages is important and also research on how to use the Greenlandic language in new and scientific terminology. Ms Pars agreed that it is important with life-long learning and that the university also needs to work more on that topic. There are more women than men studying at the university, and the use of Information and Communication Technology is not as good as it should be. There are over 500 from Greenland studying in Denmark and the Ms Pars was not aware of the number returning to Greenland after finishing university. Decision: The Committee took note of the information. 6. IMPLEMENTATION OF THE CONFERENCE STATEMENT FROM FAIRBANKS – COOPERATION WITH THE UNIVERSITY OF THE ARCTIC The item was taken off the agenda. 7. PREPARATIONS FOR THE ARCTIC CONFERENCE IN 2010 IN THE EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT The secretary general presented the following possible topics: 1. The legacy of the IPY, research and education 2. Governance of the Arctic 3. Maritime transportation 4. Sustainable use of (living) resources in the Arctic There should not be more the three different topics discussed at the conference. The members of the Committee reiterated the importance of remembering the human dimension when choosing the topics. Sustainable use of the living resources in the Arctic received much support in the committee. Research and education, combined with the follow-up of the IPY also received broad support. Then maritime policy and Arctic governance were mentioned as good topics. The secretariat was given the task to prepare a draft program based on the discussion before the next meeting in the Committee. This should take place in close cooperation with the European Parliament. The timing of the Conference was also discussed. The ministerial meeting has been moved from fall to spring, but the Committee still is of the opinion that August/September is the best time to arrange the conference. The Standing Committee should however have a meeting with the Arctic Council where the Committee highlights the results from the last conference. The meeting should take place in the beginning of the New Year, the same year as the ministerial meeting. Decision: The Committee suggests to the European Parliament to arrange the conference in September 2010. 8. DISCUSSION ON THE “RULES OF PROCEDURE” OF SCPAR The Committee continued the discussion on the “Rules of procedure” from the previous meetings in Brussels and Östersund. The Committee decided to invite the observers to a separate meeting in advance of the next conference in the European Parliament. The Committee also decided to change the “Rules of procedure” in order to elect a Vice-Chair in the Committee. The election of a Vice-Chair could take place at the next meeting of SCPAR.
Decision: The Committee will hold a separate meeting with the observers to CPAR in advance of the conference in 2010. The Committee decided to change the “Rules of Procedure” to be able to elect a Vice-Chair of SCPAR. 9. APPOINTMENT OF RAPPORTEURS IN SCPAR The Committee discussed the use of rapporteurs. Decision: The Committee appoints Ms Juliane Henningsen as rapporteur on climate change. 10. STATUS OF THE WORK OF SCPAR Mr. Kari P. Højgaard, Chairman of the West-Nordic Council, informed the Committee about the conference “Educational Opportunities for Unskilled Workers” which will take place in Greenland 4th to 7th of August, and invited SCPAR to participate. Mr. Højgaard further reiterated the recommendation from the West-Nordic Council Annual Meeting last year, to ensure sustainable utilisation of all living resources; birds, fish and mammals. The West-Nordic Council is therefore very disappointed with the decision of the European Parliament to ban trade of seal products in the European Union. The ban threatens the traditional lifestyle of indigenous peoples and other northern peoples. Mr. Højgaard referred to an Editorial in the Economist May 14, accusing the European parliament for being hypocritical when banning trade of seal products, but not addressing internal animal welfare issues. Finally Mr. Højgaard questioned the European Union’s role in shaping Arctic policies when they show at total lack of understanding of the Arctic and many of its inhabitant’s way of living, their culture and identity. Mr. Peter Goldring, Canada, informed the Committee of two parliamentary committees’ reports with recommendations for Arctic policy; regarding the use of the Coast Guard to protect Canada’s interests, and the need for involvement of the people of the North in decision-making. The Canadian government has developed a Northern Strategy that integrates many policy areas and rests on four pillars: · protecting environmental heritage; · promoting economic and social development; · exercising sovereignty; and · improving and devolving governance. There are many difficulties faced by the peoples of Canada’s North, 50% of whom are Inuit, First Nations or Métis. Canada’s Northern Strategy is focused on addressing these difficulties and improving the economic and social welfare of northerners. Canada therefore deeply regrets the recent adoption of a ban on seal products by the European Union, which will make life worse, rather than better, for our northern communities. Canada is strongly opposed to the ban and has pledged that it will fight it at the World Trade Organization. Mr. Goldring expressed satisfaction with the outcome of the Arctic Council Ministerial meeting in Tromsø. At the Arctic Council meeting, Canada announced that it will be opening a Canadian International Centre for the Arctic region in Oslo, Norway. Mr. Hannes Manninen, Finland, reported of regular meetings in the Finnish delegation where they receive reports from the Finnish representatives in the Arctic Council. Recently they have many issues regarding the future of the Northern areas – especially the Barents area. This is a good way of working nationally. Ms Sinikka Bohlin, Sweden, informed the Committee of the three seminars on the Arctic arranged in the Swedish parliament. This has taken place in good cooperation with the Swedish IPY-committee. The seminars have been very well attended. The day in advance of the Nordic Council session in Sweden (26 October 2009), an environmental meeting will take place in the Swedish parliament. The objective will be to give parliamentary input to the COP 15 in Copenhagen in December 2009. Ms Hill-Marta Solberg, Norway, informed about the government paper on the development of the Spitsbergen Islands, which will be debated in the parliament before it closes for the summer. The Arctic and the High North is still a top priority of the Norwegian government and the dialogue with Russia has been very good. Ms Gudfridur Lilja Gretarsdottir, Iceland, said that even though the country has been severely hit by the crises, it is still alive and kicking. The national election in the end of April resulted in a change of government. The Left-Green movement went from 9 to 14 seats and has formed a government together with the Social Democratic Alliance. There are 43 % women in the new parliament. The new Arctic policy in the parliament is getting increasingly important, together with subjects as maritime safety and pollution. There are many opportunities in the future Arctic, but the ban of seal products in the European Union is wrong. Ms Gretarsdottir stopped by thanking the Faroe Island in their help during the crises. Mr. Vasily Usoltsev, Russia, reported on the activities in the Russian parliament, especially social dimension. The impact of the financial crises has hit Russia. The decreasing demand and sinking prices for mineral resources gives lower income to the ministries. A program to fight the crises in the North has been established. Improving the legislation for the indigenous peoples in Northern Russia is an ongoing process. In the territories where the indigenous peoples live, special legislation, such as tax relief for the indigenous people, to improve the living situation for the living conditions. Mr. Usoltsev predicted that the interest in the Arctic from the non-Arctic states will decrease as the prices of natural resources is decreasing and makes it is less profitable to do business there. Ms. Eva Jejlid, Saami Parliamentary Council, informed about the election to the Saami Parliament in Sweden. The election didn’t bring big changes, and the new parliament will meet in August to discuss the results. There will be an election to the Saami Parliament in Norway in connection with the national Norwegian election September 14. Mr. Henrik Olsen, European Parliament, informed about the upcoming elections 4-7 June 2009. A debate on governance of the Arctic in the European Parliament was postponed. The current development of the new Arctic policy in the EU is unclear at the moment. The Swedish presidency needs to take it further. 11. NEXT MEETING Decision: The next meeting of SCPAR will be in Helsinki 19 November 2009 with a workshop the day in advance. 12. ANY OTHER BUSINESS The Chair informed the Committee of a possible meeting on human health in Copenhagen in the beginning of November. The Committee is positive to the idea and leaves it to each member to decide whether or not to participate.
Decision: The Secretary General stays in contact with the AC chairmanship to explore the further opportunities. 13. NEW LEADERSHIP OF SCPAR The Chair of SCPAR Ms Hill-Marta Solberg is not running for re-election in the national election in Norway 14 September 2009. The meeting in Ilulissat was her last meeting in SCPAR. Mr. Hannes Manninen was proposed as the new Chair of SCPAR until the next conference of Arctic parliamentarians in 2010. Decision: The Committee unanimously elected Mr. Hannes Manninen as Chair of SCPAR until the CPAR in 2010.
CONFERENCE OF PARLIAMENTARIANS OF THE
ARCTIC REGION MEETING IN ILULISSAT Draft List of participants MEMBERS Canada Mr. Peter Goldring, MP Mr. Robert Oliphant, MP Dr. Tim Williams, Science and Technology Division, Parliamentary Information and Research Service Denmark Ms. Juliane Henningsen, MP Mr. Peder H. Pedersen, Adviser Ms. Jonna Sandø EP Mr. Henrik Olsen, Principal Administrator, Inter-Parliamentary Relations Finland Mr. Hannes Manninen, MP Mr. Guy Lindström, Deputy Director Iceland Ms. Gudfridur Lilja Gretarsdottir, MP Ms. Arna Bang, Adviser Norway Ms. Hill-Marta Solberg, MP Russia Mr. Vasily Usoltsev, MP Mrs. Irina Kuzmina, Secretary Mrs. Valentina Anufrieva - expert Sweden Ms Sinikka Bohlin, MP Ms Eva Hjelm, Senior Officer PERMANENT PARTICIPANTS Saami Parliamentary Ms Eva Jejlid, Saami Parliamentary Councill OBSERVERS West-Nordic Council Mr. Kári P. Højgaard, President of the West-Nordic Council, MP from the Faeroe Islands Mr. Thordur Thorarinsson, Secretary General Nordic Council Mr. Niels Sindal, MP, Denmark GUESTS Mr. Inuuteq Holm Olsen, Director, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Greenland Ms Tine Pars, Rector, University of Greenland, Ms Dorthe Dahl-Jensen, Professor, the University of Copenhagen Ms Lene Kielsen Holm, ICC, Greenland Mr. Per Rosing Petersen, MP, Greenlandic parliament Ms Ruth Heilman, Speaker, Greenlandic parliament SECRETARIAT Mr. Bjørn Willy Robstad, Secretary General
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