"The European security situation calls for greater aviation sustainment capacity. Through Defence Aviation Services, we can take on more maintenance work, free military personnel for operational tasks, and build the sovereign capability Denmark and its allies will increasingly require," said Oscar Cosman Brøndum, the venture's interim chief executive.

U.S. Navy (public domain), via Wikimedia Commons

The two parents bring different halves of the trade. Terma contributes its long standing experience supporting the Danish Armed Forces. From Norway, KAMS contributes a maintenance, repair and overhaul track record built over decades on the country's military fleets. Its work at home has covered engines and helicopters, modern types such as the F-35 and the P-8, the older F-16, and the logistics and training that go with them, the launch release said.

What the venture will do

The new company will maintain, repair and overhaul military aircraft, and says it will train the people, and build the industrial depth, that rising sustainment demand requires. Its aims include closer cooperation among Nordic and allied operators of the same aircraft types, a stronger base of skilled staff and sovereign industrial skill, and better readiness and security of supply in Denmark and the wider Nordic area.

"The launch of Defence Aviation Services reflects a shared belief that future defence challenges are best addressed through allied cooperation and strong national industrial capabilities," said Øyvind Kolset, the chairman of the KAMS board of directors. Henriette Hallberg Thygesen, the chief executive of Terma, said the ambition goes beyond creating additional maintenance capacity, towards a long term Nordic sustainment capability around shared military platforms.

Brian Burnell / CC BY-SA, via Wikimedia Commons

The launch comes while European governments spend more on defence and focus harder on keeping the forces they have ready, supplied and serviceable for the long term, the release said. That shift creates demand not only for new platforms but for workshops, skilled hands and guaranteed access to maintenance across a platform's working life. Now that it has launched, the company is building up in Denmark, aiming to support fleets flown by Nordic and other allied air forces.

Oslo framed the meeting as one step in the diplomatic work aimed at a peace for Ukraine that is both just and built to last. Mr Støre said: "We agree that it is crucial to work together, to look to the future and to do everything we can to help ensure that the diplomatic process is on the right track. Peace is possible, and it is necessary, for Ukraine, for Europe, and for the entire world."

Torbjørn Kjosvold / Office of the Prime Minister / CC BY 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons

The agenda ranged across Ukraine's security, a prosperity plan for the period after the war, and territorial questions, according to the government's account. In his introduction at the joint press conference on Tuesday evening, Mr Støre gave a wider list, adding sanctions and questions related to the European security order to the subjects the leaders had taken up during the day.

A next step in St. Petersburg

The press conference also set out the next move in the process. Mr Støre told reporters that Mr Witkoff would fly on to St. Petersburg on Wednesday to meet the Russian leadership, carrying the ideas from the Oslo meeting and the proposals worked on by European and American colleagues, and possibly paving the way for a meeting at leaders' level. No outcome from that Russian leg is recorded in the Norwegian records published in this run, and none is claimed here.

Mr Støre described the day in Oslo in measured terms. "We have had good, constructive talks today. I would like to acknowledge everyone's positive contributions to the discussions and focus on finding potential ways forward," he said in the government's account. At the press conference he repeated Norway's standing line on how any settlement must be reached: "We have always made it clear; there will be nothing about Ukraine without Ukraine."

Leharu / CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons

The work continued after the press conference. The national security advisers from the United Kingdom, Germany, Italy, the European Union and NATO joined the discussions at a working dinner, the government said. Mr Støre underlined how closely Norway works with Finland, with its other European allies and with the United States in trying to move towards peace.

The handover at Nel starts sooner than the arrival. The board has agreed with Mr Volldal that he will be relieved of his executive duties at the end of October 2026. From Nov. 1, Kjell Christian Bjørnsen, who has been Nel's chief financial officer since 2020, will serve as interim chief executive until Mr Holum starts, and Torbjørn Berg, the company's vice president for finance, will serve as interim chief financial officer.

Kognos / CC BY 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Mr Holum comes from the same industry, and Nel's release credits him with seven years of hydrogen work around the world, spanning the technology itself, its end markets and its rules. He joins from Hexagon Purus, where he has been president and chief executive since March 2020. He arrived in the wider Hexagon group a year earlier, in 2019, as executive vice president and chief operating officer of Hexagon Composites. Earlier still he ran Saferoad Group, holding both the chief executive and chief financial officer roles there at different times, and his background also takes in Norske Skog, Norsk Hydro and American Airlines. His education runs from a bachelor's degree covering finance and psychology, taken at Østfold University College and the University of Oslo, to an MBA earned at Chapel Hill, at the University of North Carolina.

What the two boards said

"Morten brings the broad international experience, leadership and commercial mindset required at this stage of Nel's development," said Arvid Moss, the chair of Nel's board. Mr Moss pointed to recent orders with Collins Aerospace and a leading technology company in the United States, and said defence work, pointing to the recent Rheinmetall announcement, is becoming a more relevant source of future growth. Mr Holum said: "Nel has long been a company I have admired." He added: "I am excited to join the team and build on what has already been achieved."

The release also sets out the incoming chief executive's long term pay terms. On top of his salary, and alongside the company's long term incentive programme, Mr Holum has been awarded a programme valued at NOK 5 million, made up of restricted stock units worth NOK 3 million and a cash element of NOK 2 million, with the first performance share unit grant expected in 2028 and a value cap of NOK 25 million on the restricted stock unit awards.

Norsk olje og gass / CC BY-SA 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Hexagon Purus published the other side of the move the same day. Its release said Mr Holum has decided to step down as chief executive to leave for a new opportunity elsewhere, that its board has appointed Salman Alam as interim chief executive effective Nov. 1, 2026, and that Mr Alam will also continue as chief financial officer. Mr Holum will take on a role as adviser to the chief executive after the transition and will be available over the coming months to support a handover. Mr Alam has been with Hexagon Purus since 2020. "On behalf of the Board, I would like to thank Morten for his leadership, dedication and commitment to Hexagon Purus," said Jon Erik Engeset, the chair of its board.

Nel describes itself as a pure play hydrogen technology company specialising in electrolyser technology, both PEM and alkaline, used to produce renewable hydrogen, with a history tracing back to 1927. Hexagon Purus works on zero emission mobility, supplying battery systems and vehicle integration work alongside its hydrogen Type 4 high pressure cylinders and systems.

The meeting was held at Ukraine's request. Prime Minister Støre said: "President Zelenskyy has asked Norway and Finland to organise a meeting as part of the ongoing diplomatic efforts at this critical time for Ukraine. President Stubb and I are very pleased to be able to host this meeting in Oslo." Støre acted as host of the talks with the two presidents on the situation in Ukraine, and a joint press conference with President Zelenskyy, President Stubb and the prime minister followed the meeting.

Espandero / CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Finland's presidential office announced President Stubb's working visit to Oslo the same day and confirmed that the two US special envoys would also join the meetings. Its agenda summary put the war in Ukraine, which Finland calls an illegal war of aggression by Russia, alongside the broader security picture in Europe.

US special envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner both took part in the Oslo meetings on the situation in Ukraine, the prime minister's office said. Mr Witkoff travelled to Oslo, while Mr Kushner participated remotely. Prime Minister Støre said: "Ukraine has requested that US Special Envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner join the meetings. I am pleased that they are able to participate." He added that diplomatic efforts had previously taken place in several countries, that Norway and Finland were pleased to continue the work, and that "the aim is to put diplomatic efforts on a more constructive path".

The Oslo day put Norway and Finland, two of Ukraine's northern European partners, in the host's chair for a round of diplomacy that has previously been held in several other countries. The programme the hosts published ran from the meeting table to the Royal Palace and the Storting, giving the visit a full state welcome alongside the working talks.

GPSLeo / CC0, via Wikimedia Commons

The case for acting now, in the Commission's telling, is the speed of change in the far north. The Arctic is warming nearly four times faster than the global average, the Commission said, affecting ecosystems, livelihoods and communities, and more than half a million EU citizens live in the Arctic through the Kingdom of Denmark, Finland and Sweden. Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said: "The Arctic is Europe's Northern Neighbourhood - close, connected and critical to our future."

AWeith / CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Security is now a stronger part of the EU's Arctic approach than in 2021. The EU will work with its member states and Arctic partners, in complementarity with NATO, on preparedness, on shielding critical infrastructure, and on building Europe's capacity to operate in Arctic conditions, with better monitoring, closer information sharing and a stronger ability to respond when risks emerge at sea or on land. The flagship projects are a Maritime Security Hub for information sharing from seabed to space, beginning with an Arctic Cable Hub to monitor, protect and support the repair of submarine cables in the North Atlantic and Arctic, work to expand European icebreaker capacity, and an Arctic surveillance pilot planned for 2027.

The climate strand keeps the EU's wider targets in force in the north: the strategy maintains the ambition of a 90 percent net emissions reduction by 2040 and climate neutrality by 2050, and strengthens climate research, observation and monitoring. Its OceanEye flagship, a new ocean monitoring initiative, will bring together EU member states and partners including Canada and Norway to collect and share ocean data, improving climate prediction, maritime safety and adaptation. The economy strand adds a Pan Arctic Cable for submarine connectivity linking Greenland directly to Europe, with possible extensions towards Canada and Japan, secure satellite connectivity under the IRIS2 programme, and a new EU Polar Research Hub built by reinforcing the European Polar Coordination Office.

The fourth priority is people. The strategy places Arctic local communities and Indigenous Peoples at the centre of the EU's approach, with a focus on education, employment, skills and social inclusion, expanded Erasmus+ opportunities for Arctic young people, and an Arctic Mayors' Forum initiative bringing together 22 Arctic towns and cities. The EU says it will uphold the principle of free, prior and informed consent in its dialogue with Indigenous representatives. The strategy was prepared after exchanges with governments, young people, local communities, Indigenous Peoples, businesses and researchers across the Arctic, and is meant to complement existing structures, including the Arctic Council.

Peter Vermeij / Svalbard Global Seed Vault / CC BY, via Wikimedia Commons

Under the test the government has adopted, a service counts as a harmful social medium when the way it is designed, the features it offers or the material it carries creates a risk to children's emotional or cognitive development, to their health, or to their safety. The risks the law is meant to reach run from harmful content and design that keeps children hooked, through unlawful marketing aimed at them, to unwanted contact from strangers, and the government says the same test gives companies a reason to strip those features out. Whether a service is harmful will be judged on evidence, with assessments kept current as the technology changes. On the government's reading, TikTok, Roblox and Snapchat, in their present form, will all fall under the law.

Espandero / CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons

The change is a redrawing of the bill rather than a narrowing of it. Without a harm test, ministers had needed blanket exceptions so that ordinary messaging tools, including apps schools use to talk to pupils, and harmless games that matter a great deal to young players stayed outside the law. With the test in place, those exceptions can go, and services will be sorted by what they do to children instead of by what they call themselves. The Norwegian Media Authority welcomed the approach the same day, arguing that the starting point for regulation has to be whether a service can harm children, and pointing to addictive mechanisms, pressure to buy and the risk of contact with strangers on game platforms and other services that increasingly resemble social media.

The regulator's own research shows why games are in the frame. Its Children and Media 2026 survey found that 81 percent of Norwegian children aged nine to 12 use Roblox, and the authority will publish a dedicated report on the platform, titled Roblox under radaren, on Thursday, Oct. 22, at its gaming conference. The age limit itself is unchanged from the framework the government set out in April: it applies until Jan. 1 of the year a child turns 16, so a whole school cohort crosses the line together and every pupil is at least 15 when access opens. Vågslid explained the cohort rule in April by saying: "We want to ensure inclusion and a sense of community."

Enforcement will run through the Digital Services Act, whose sanctions and enforcement duties the national age-limit law activates, and the government says getting the digital services law in place quickly is a high priority. Companies, not children or parents, carry the duty to check ages: providers must offer age verification that actually works, respects privacy and meets the conditions of the European data protection rules, and ministers expect compliance from the first day. The proposal has already been consulted on in Norway and in the European Economic Area, and the government still plans to lay the bill before the Storting before the end of the year.

GPSLeo / CC0, via Wikimedia Commons

The five sites were chosen to cover three kinds of ground. Horvnes quay near Sandnessjøen and the Kongsbergporten Business Park will host operations at places where no runway exists today. Oslo and Trondheim airports will test how the aircraft fits into large, busy airport environments. Mosjøen Airport, in Northern Norway, stands in for the country's many short-runway airfields, where the partners want to assess both what the aircraft can do and the new approach procedures it may need.

JP Stewart / Electra, via PR Newswire

Each partner is looking for a different answer. Avinor's executive vice president for sustainability and infrastructure, Karianne Helland Strand, said the point was to "test the technology under different conditions and in different parts of the aviation system", so the partners learn what new aircraft will demand of infrastructure, airspace, procedures and rules. The aviation authority's director of innovation, research and sustainability, Jan Petter Steinland, said flying in so many settings would show whether the existing rulebook is fit for purpose, and how an aircraft with the EL2's characteristics can be mixed safely with other traffic. Dave Stepanek of Bristow said the chosen sites would show the flexibility of ultra-short aircraft across operating environments, and that detailed planning for next year's demonstrations can now begin.

The demonstrations sit inside Norway's international test arena for zero- and low-emission aviation, a government-backed initiative led by Avinor and the aviation authority, with state funding, which opens the airport network and Norwegian airspace to structured testing of new aircraft. The EL2 itself is Electra's two-seat Goldfinch demonstrator: eight electric propellers blow air over its wing to generate the lift for ultra-short takeoffs and landings, and it made its first flights in Virginia in November 2023, flying all-electric on Nov. 11 and hybrid-electric on Nov. 19 of that year, according to Electra's release at the time.

Work now turns to preparation. The partners will draw up the detailed test programme, secure the approvals the flights need and get each location ready, with the first demonstration flight planned for the third quarter of 2027. What the flights show about infrastructure, operations and regulation at the five sites is intended to shape the requirements Norway sets when aircraft of this kind move from demonstration to service.

Bahnfrend / CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons

The match was effectively settled in its first quarter of an hour. Sara Isabella Lepore opened the scoring in the sixth minute with a strike from 30 yards that went in off the underside of the crossbar, the Ghana association reported, and Maia Melgard doubled the lead in the 13th minute, shifting the ball onto her left foot and curling it home after Hanne Nesse had laid it off at the edge of the box. The official play-by-play data records the same scorers and minutes: Lepore on six minutes, Melgard on 13.

Remi Jouan / CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Ghana, returning to the tournament after missing the last edition, improved after half-time and came closest when substitute Cynthia Obinsrewuo was sent clean through, only for Norway goalkeeper Erla Braathen to stand tall and deny her, the Ghana association reported. Braathen, Lepore, Melgard and Nesse are all named in the Norway squad listing published by DAZN, in goal, midfield and attack respectively.

Melgard completed the scoring in the 80th minute, the play-by-play data shows, sealing her second goal of the evening and the 3-0 result. The Ghana association described the third as another effort from distance, Melgard cutting inside before beating goalkeeper Belinda Manu Aklie. The win puts three points on the board for Elise Brotangen's side in a group that also contains Brazil and Canada.

Norway's group campaign continues quickly. They play Canada on Wednesday, Oct. 21, and Brazil on Saturday, Oct. 24, according to the fixture listing published by DAZN, which also sets out the route on offer: the top two teams in each group advance to the knockout stages automatically, joined by the four best third-placed sides. After a debut tournament last year that ended in the group stage, a first win at these finals is the platform Norway came for.

Jorge Láscar / CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Foreign Minister Espen Barth Eide set the signing in a wider push to spread Norway's trade ties. "In a more unpredictable world, Norway needs to diversify its trade relations," he said in the government's statement, noting that Norway has signed seven new free trade agreements since the government took office. "The agreement with Viet Nam opens new opportunities for Norwegian businesses and strengthens trade relations with a country that shares our commitment to rules-based trade."

Kora27 / CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons

For Norwegian exporters the practical core is the tariff schedule. It starts the day the deal takes effect, when duties fall away on roughly one in two of the goods Norway sells to Viet Nam, and it tightens over the following seven years until more than 98 percent of those goods cross duty-free; at the end of the process, duties are gone on nearly everything. The trade at stake is already substantial: goods worth around NOK 19 billion moved between Norway and Viet Nam in 2025, the government says, and the EFTA Secretariat puts two-way goods trade between the four EFTA states and Viet Nam at EUR 4.8 billion in the same year.

Seafood is the clearest early winner. Vietnamese duties on Norwegian salmon and mackerel run as high as 15 percent today. Salmon loses its duty entirely on day one; mackerel takes a slower path, with its duties disappearing over three years. "The agreement will give Norwegian seafood exporters conditions on a par with those enjoyed by key competitors and create opportunities for increased seafood exports to Viet Nam," said Minister of Fisheries and Ocean Policy Marianne Sivertsen Næss. Minister of Trade and Industry Cecilie Myrseth called Viet Nam "one of the fastest-growing economies in Asia" and said the agreement gives Norwegian businesses better market access and greater predictability.

The agreement reaches well beyond goods. Both the EFTA Secretariat and Viet Nam's trade ministry describe a wide-ranging pact: services and investment sit alongside chapters on buying by governments, protection for ideas and brands, help for smaller companies, food safety and plant health rules, and sustainable development. Its signing ends a long road: negotiations were launched in Hanoi on July 2, 2012, ran for 16 rounds until they slowed in 2018, were relaunched on Sept. 8, 2025 for five additional rounds, and concluded on July 2, 2026, according to the EFTA Secretariat.

Syced / CC0, via Wikimedia Commons

The 23-year-old Visma | Lease a Bike rider countered a late move by Toms Skujins before striking for home on the Boulevard Béranger. Jasper Stuyven of Soudal Quick-Step finished second, two seconds behind, with Hagenes' teammate Christophe Laporte third.

KvaraWolves88 / CC0 1.0, via Wikimedia Commons

The race turned on its trademark vineyard tracks in the final 70 kilometres, where the peloton was thinned by a crash that brought down Dorian Godon, among the pre-race favourites, along with Arnaud De Lie and Anthony Turgis, and a solo move by Pierre Gautherat was chased down before the finale.

The win was Hagenes' second of the 2026 season, after the Antwerp Port Epic, and the fifth of his professional career, according to IDL Procycling. Earlier in the day, Spain's Hector Alvarez won the under-23 Paris-Tours Espoirs, the first Spaniard to do so, according to Cyclry.

Renhour48 (René Hourdry) / CC0 1.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Core inflation, measured by the CPI-ATE index that strips out tax changes and energy products, held steady at 3.0 percent. Prices rose 0.5 percent from August to September, while the core index rose 0.2 percent, the agency said.

Wolfmann / CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Food and non-alcoholic beverages cost 2.4 percent more than a year earlier, accelerating from 1.6 percent in August, according to dpa-AFX. Transport costs climbed 4.8 percent and health costs 4.9 percent in Statistics Norway's figures, while restaurant and accommodation services rose 6.0 percent.

The September figures arrive two weeks after Norges Bank raised its policy rate to 4.5 percent on Sept. 24. Governor Ida Wolden Bache told a press conference that inflation had been above target for several years, and that the committee was prepared to raise the rate further if needed to bring inflation back to target.

Presenting the 2027 state budget on Oct. 7, the government projected core inflation of 3.1 percent for 2026, easing to 2.8 percent in 2027, and mainland GDP growth of 1.7 percent next year, according to Reuters.

Flickr / Wikimedia Commons (CC BY 2.0)

The proposal is part of the government's 2027 budget bill, unveiled on Wednesday. Measured in fixed 2027 prices, spending from the fund would rise by 4.9 billion crowns, or $513 million, compared with 2026, the government said, according to OilPrice. The planned drawdown equals 2.7 percent of the fund's projected value at the end of 2026, in line with the current year.

Via Wikimedia Commons

The bill must now be negotiated with four centrist and left-wing parties to pass the Storting, Reuters reported, since Labour governs in a minority.

The government said the budget proposal is estimated to have a neutral effect on activity in the economy next year.

The budget assumes the economy outside the oil industry will grow by 1.1 percent this year, down from 1.7 percent expected in May, and by 1.7 percent in 2027, slightly up from the 1.6 percent previously forecast, Reuters reported. Core inflation is seen at 3.1 percent this year, down from 3.2 percent seen in May, easing to 2.8 percent in 2027 against 2.6 percent previously expected.

Via Wikimedia Commons

The structural non-oil deficit for 2027, the key measure of how much oil-fund money the government spends, is expected to be 2.7 percent of the fund's projected value at the end of 2026, the same level as this year, according to Reuters.

GPSLeo / CC0, via Wikimedia Commons

The suspect was arrested at the scene, and witnesses restrained him until officers took him into custody. Later on Sunday, police confirmed a connection between the man and the hunting party; Norwegian media reported that he had previously belonged to it.

Geir Hval (MacWhale) / CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons

The two who died were father and son, the father in his 70s and the son in his 40s, police operations leader Wilhelm Bjølseth told NTB. The seriously injured man, also in his 40s, was flown to hospital by air ambulance, and his condition is stable, according to the prosecutor. The shooting happened near Halden, about 96 kilometres from Oslo and close to the Swedish border.

Police received the first reports of the shooting at 7:30 a.m. on Sunday, and announced the arrest at 8 a.m. Prosecutors suspect a conflict is behind the attack; the motive remains under investigation.

Ralf Hüsges / CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons

The subsidiary of the German defence group Rheinmetall AG says the site, in the village of Skoppum in Horten municipality in Vestfold, will serve the Norwegian Armed Forces, international customers and other Rheinmetall businesses.

Espen Franck-Nielsen / CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons

The site is designed to accommodate 127 employees, with 100 based there at the opening. Rheinmetall has signed a 15-year lease, with potential for future expansion of up to around 5,000 square metres.

The opening was attended by representatives of the Norwegian Armed Forces, the government and regional authorities, alongside customers, industry partners and representatives of Rheinmetall companies from across Europe. The programme included factory tours and technology demonstrations.

Electro-optics and fire control

The site's work will focus on electro-optical systems, fire control systems, situational awareness technology, weapon accessories and systems integration, established specialisations of Rheinmetall Nordic, which says it has more than 70 years of experience in the Norwegian defence industry.

Oxfordian Kissuth / CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons

"The opening of our new site in Skoppum represents a significant investment in the future of Rheinmetall Nordic," said Morten Kjørum, the subsidiary's chief executive. "It lays the foundation for greater capacity, innovation, and value creation, while also strengthening our ability to support our customers and partners."

The company linked the expansion to demand for defence readiness, resilient supply chains and independent industrial capability in Europe.

Oscar Bobb put the World Cup quarter-finalists ahead inside eleven minutes, exchanging passes with Martin Odegaard to burst past Ben Davies and beat Danny Ward at the near post.

Werner100359 / CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Wales levelled seven minutes before half-time. Liam Cullen dispossessed Sander Berge to launch a rapid counter-attack, Lewis Koumas fed Sorba Thomas, and Thomas's cross was swept home by Daniel James for his eleventh Wales goal.

The red card that turned it

The contest tilted within seconds of the restart. Torbjorn Heggem dragged down James just outside the penalty area with the winger denied a free run on goal, and the referee showed a straight red card for denying a goalscoring opportunity.

Neco Williams punished Norway from the resulting free kick, arrowing his strike past Orjan Nyland, whose first step to the left proved fatal as the ball flew to his right.

Steve Barnes / CC BY-SA 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Haaland's quiet night

Erling Haaland was kept quiet all evening and drew a rare international blank. His first sight of goal came in the 58th minute, when he climbed above Davies only to head David Moller Wolfe's cross over the bar.

The win was Wales's first of 2026 and their first in the top tier of the Nations League at the ninth attempt, after one draw and seven defeats across two campaigns. It also eased the pressure on manager Craig Bellamy, who had not tasted victory since thrashing North Macedonia in a World Cup qualifier last November.

Bryan Berlin / CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons

The work concentrated on the Kvitingskjølen mountain area, at the Langfonne, Storfonne and Handklefonne ice patches, during three weeks of fieldwork. The team reports that ice is disappearing much faster than expected, and that large areas recently covered by ice are now ice-free.

Frys film, Innlandet County Municipality / Secrets of the Ice

The pattern of the finds has changed. When the programme began in 2006, most recovered objects were less than 2,000 years old, with Viking Age finds especially common, and objects older than 2,000 years relatively rare. Now the finds melting out of the ice are increasingly older than 2,000 years, with many dating to the Stone Age and Bronze Age. The oldest finds from the wider programme date back more than 6,000 years.

The connection is direct: the oldest ice contains the oldest finds. Langfonne, once a large ice patch, has split into several smaller patches, and the team expects it to be completely gone within 20 years.

What makes the ice finds special is the preservation of organic materials, wood, hide, sinew and textiles, which would normally decay. Once exposed, those materials start to decay, so every field season is a race. This year's recoveries include a bone arrowhead about 5,000 years old found with parts of its shaft beside the ice, and an arrowhead of freshwater mussel shell about 3,600 years old that has begun to split.

Åsa Rommetveit Celius, Innlandet County Municipality / Secrets of the Ice

This year marks 20 years of glacial archaeology in Innlandet. Since 2006, the programme has recorded 73 archaeological sites and recovered more than 5,000 artefacts. Some of this season's finds are already on public view in a refrigerated fresh-finds display at the Norwegian Mountain Centre in Lom.

Espen Finstad, Innlandet County Municipality / Secrets of the Ice

Over the same period, consumer prices have risen by around 5.5 percent. That means Oslo homes have become significantly cheaper in real terms even though their nominal prices have changed little, a slowdown for a city where buying a home was for years associated with rapidly rising prices.

Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 2.5)

But cheaper in real terms does not mean easier to afford. High interest rates and weak purchasing power are making it increasingly difficult for first-time buyers to take advantage of the slowdown.

The national picture sharpens the contrast. So far in 2026, Norwegian house prices are up 4.9 percent, with the Ålesund area and Tromsø leading at 12.4 and 11.7 percent. Oslo, at 0.3 percent growth, is the country's weakest major market this year.

Supply is not the constraint in the capital: Oslo listings have stayed elevated through the flat period, leaving buyers with choice but without purchasing power.

Pali / Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 4.0)

For young buyers, the trap is the combination: prices flat but unaffordable, because the 4.50 percent policy rate sets the mortgage terms. A buyer's market in prices is not a buyer's market in monthly payments, and that is the market first-time buyers actually live in.

The Commission has described the policy review as a response to changing geopolitical and geoeconomic conditions in the Arctic: increased military activity and hybrid threats, and growing interest in the region's resources, energy and emerging trade routes.

AWeith / Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 4.0)

The updated strategy is expected to frame the Arctic's growing importance to the bloc's defence and climate ambitions. Brussels has stressed that the moratorium remains a non-binding political commitment, not a legal prohibition on Norwegian activity on Norway's own continental shelf.

Norway's answer, delivered on Sept. 11, was the APA 2026 applicant list: 21 companies, including Equinor, Aker BP, ConocoPhillips, TotalEnergies and a returning Shell, bidding for acreage across the North Sea, the Norwegian Sea and the Barents Sea. Awards are targeted for early 2027.

Energy Minister Terje Aasland's argument is that continued exploration and new discoveries are crucial for Norway to remain a stable supplier of oil and gas, a position that treats European energy security as the counterweight to Brussels' moratorium.

AWeith / Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 4.0)

The two positions now run in parallel: a European moratorium on new Arctic development, and a Norwegian licensing round that includes Arctic acreage. The Barents Sea blocks in APA 2026 are where the contradiction is sharpest, and where the awards early next year will be read most closely.

The United States finished second with 33 medals, 12 gold, 12 silver and 9 bronze, and the Netherlands third with 20 medals, 10 gold, 7 silver and 3 bronze. Host nation Italy finished with 30 medals, 10 gold, 6 silver and 14 bronze.

trine.syvertsen / Flickr / Wikimedia Commons (CC BY 2.0)

The 18 gold medals set a Winter Olympics record for a single nation, according to reports on the final table. Norway's strength ran across the program, with the country's development system producing podium finishes in cross-country skiing, biathlon and the alpine disciplines.

The table is ordered by the International Olympic Committee's conventional sorting: gold medals first, then silver, then bronze. By that method Norway's margin over the United States, six golds, is decisive rather than close.

For the Norwegian winter sports establishment, the result extends a pattern: the most successful nation in Winter Olympic history adding its most successful single Games. The closing ceremony in February formally ended the Italian fortnight; the numbers have been the reference point for every winter sports debate since.

Flickr / Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 2.0)

The next Winter Games are scheduled for the French Alps in 2030. Norway's task there will be the one it has set itself at every Games since the streak began: defending a standard it keeps raising.

That is a specific prohibition, not a general demilitarization. Legal analysis of the treaty distinguishes between the ban on naval bases, fortifications and warlike use, and the broader claim that Svalbard is a demilitarized zone. The shorthand gets repeated; the text is narrower.

Hgrobe / Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 4.0)

The distinction matters because the archipelago keeps appearing in security arguments. The treaty's regime grants Norway sovereignty while giving all parties equal rights of access and economic activity, a combination that has produced a century of legal argument about what the sovereignty covers.

Recent years have added pressure to the old text. Increased military activity in the Arctic, cited in the European Commission's ongoing Arctic policy review, has made the treaty's security provisions a live question again.

Norway's position, restated over decades, is that the treaty is respected and enforced, and that the archipelago's regime functions as written. The seed vault's mountain, the coal settlement at Barentsburg, the research stations at Ny-Ålesund: all operate inside the same legal frame.

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For readers encountering the treaty for the first time, the rule is simple: read Article 9 as a ban on naval bases, fortifications and warlike use, and treat every claim beyond that as an argument, not a quotation.

The pairing is the Norwegian model in miniature: license the search for new resources, and bind the spending of the proceeds that result. The APA round expands the predefined area by 70 blocks or parts of blocks across the North Sea, the Norwegian Sea and the Barents Sea, with awards targeted for early 2027.

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The fiscal framework constrains what any discoveries can buy. The white paper's 3 percent path governs the structural non-oil deficit, which is the amount of petroleum revenue the state may spend each year. Gradual adjustment means the spending room moves slowly, even when the fund's value moves fast.

The numbers show why the frame matters. The oil fund reported a first-half return of 9.4 percent this year, with an accounting return of 1,753 billion kroner, and the fund's value stood at 22,683 billion kroner at the end of June. Under the spending rule, only a fraction of such a year can flow into the budget.

For the companies on the APA applicant list, which includes Equinor, Aker BP, ConocoPhillips, TotalEnergies and a returning Shell, the fiscal frame is a feature, not a bug. Predictable taxation and stable spending rules are part of what the Ministry sells when it markets the shelf.

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The tension the Storting will manage is the same one the Melkøya vote exposed in February: the state wants both the emissions cuts and the export revenues, the grid capacity and the industrial power demand. The licensing round and the white paper are the two instruments it uses to hold both at once.

The fund's value stood at 22,683 billion kroner at the end of June, an increase of 1,416 billion kroner over the six months. Currency movements worked against the result: the krone effect was minus 427 billion kroner, while net inflows after costs added 89 billion.

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Equities did the heavy lifting. At the end of June the fund held 72.1 percent in equities, 25.8 percent in fixed income, 1.6 percent in unlisted real estate and 0.5 percent in renewable energy infrastructure.

The record half arrives in the same month the government set out its fiscal course in the budget white paper: a 3 percent spending path for petroleum revenues and gradual fiscal adjustment. However large the fund grows, the structural non-oil deficit rule decides how much of it the state may use.

That discipline is the point of the fund's design. The 9.4 percent return belongs to future generations first, and the budget second. With 21 companies now bidding for new exploration acreage under APA 2026, the pipeline that built the fund is being licensed to continue.

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For the companies paying the petroleum taxes that feed the fund, the half-year numbers are a reminder of the bargain: Norway taxes the resource heavily, spends the proceeds slowly, and keeps the surplus invested abroad. The fund's scale is the visible result.

The February deposit, the first of 2026, added 7,864 samples from 10 depositors, bringing the total at that point to 1,386,102 samples. The two deposits together added more than 23,000 samples of the world's crop diversity to the backup collection this year.

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The vault, opened in 2008, stores duplicates of seed collections from genebanks around the world as insurance against loss from conflict, natural disaster or mismanagement. Deposits are made a few times each year, and the vault now holds samples from nearly every country with a national genebank.

The milestone lands in a year when Svalbard's legal status is back under scrutiny. The seed vault's existence depends on the same treaty framework that governs the archipelago: Norwegian sovereignty, equal access for treaty parties, and the archipelago's special legal regime.

The vault's operator, the Norwegian government, deposits alongside international genebanks. The Crop Trust, which helps fund the vault's operations, has described the crossing of the 1.4 million mark as a milestone for global food security.

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The next deposit window will be announced by the government later this year. For the genebanks that deposited in June, the mountain above Longyearbyen now holds the backup copy of collections their own countries cannot afford to lose.

There was a startlingly strong growth in house prices in August, especially in light of the fact that July was the weakest July month in the history of house price statistics.Henning Lauridsen, chief executive of Eiendom Norge

So far in 2026, house prices in Norway have risen by 4.9 percent. In August, only Fredrikstad/Sarpsborg and Drammen saw negative seasonally adjusted development; every other city posted nominal and seasonally adjusted growth.

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The national picture hides a split. Oslo, the country's largest market, has the weakest price growth so far this year at 0.3 percent. The Ålesund area and Tromsø lead year-to-date growth at 12.4 and 11.7 percent, reflecting local labour-market strength in energy and shipping rather than national exuberance.

Activity remains high even as prices climb. In August, 9,594 homes were sold, and 13,077 were listed for sale. It took an average of 50 days to sell a home, down from 62 days in July. So far this year, 72,290 homes have been sold, 4.7 percent fewer than in the same period last year.

The August surge lands days before Norges Bank's September rate decision, and the two numbers now argue with each other. Rising house prices pull toward tighter policy; the 4.50 percent rate the bank then set will test how much of August's strength was momentum and how much was leverage.

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