Russian timber sales companies have piled up to 10 million cubic meters of timber along the border to Finland awaiting sales to the Finnish wood processing industry.

Prime Minister Vladimir Putin proposes to offer Russian equipment and armament to the neighboring countries’ border guard services.

Issues of perfection of customs registration in frontier areas was on the agenda when Russia’s Prime Minister Vladimir Putin had a meeting with the State Border Commission in Petrozavodsk on Thursday.

Nikolai Levin will be the new city mayor of Petrozavodsk. The candidate of the United Russia party got a comfortable win in the local city mayor elections.

Northwest Russian regions should have a joint trans-border policy, one of the top presidential aides to the area argues.

The Karelian newspaper Iskra is coming under strong pressure from governor Sergei Katanandov after publishing a story with strong criticism of President Dmitry Medvedev.

One of the candidates in the upcoming city mayor election in Petrozavodsk, Republic of Karelia, has left the United Russia party, because of what he sees as the regional party leadership’s bureaucratic and hypocritical policies.

The Barents Cooperation helps create trust and is useful for both the national and regional levels of power, Russian State Duma representative Valentina Pivnenko highlighted in this week’s Barents Parliamentary Conference.

The new Barents Programme is to help strengthen East-West cooperation between the 13 regions in the Barents Region.

The Barents Regional Council should become a much stronger political body than it is today, Council Chair Pauli Saapunki highlighted in a council session this Wednesday. He believes the council, which includes political leaders from 13 Nordic and Northwest Russian regions, should have a bigger say in High North cross-border issues.