
suspected al-Qaida members were arrested for what Norwegian and US
officials said was a terrorist plot linked to similar plans to bomb
New York's subway and blow up a shopping mall in England. A 3rd
suspect was arrested in Germany. Authorities later said the
ringleader of the plot is Mikael Davud (39), an Uighur who came to
Norway in 1999 as part of a UN refugee program and then became a
Norwegian citizen eight years later. Davud was arrested along with
suspected accomplices Shawan Sadek Saeed Bujak Bujak, an Iraqi Kurd
(37), and Uzbek national, David Jakobsen (31). Norwegian and Danish
police later said the 3 were likely planning an attack against a
Danish newspaper that caricatured the Prophet Muhammad. Jakobsen was
released on Oct 15 after prosecutors revealed that he had been a
police informant in the case. Jakobsen still faced terrorism charges
because the allegations against the group rely partly on events that
took place before he approached police last year.
(AP, 7/8/10)(AP, 8/29/10)(AP, 9/28/10)(AP,
2010 Aug 11, Norway pledged to
work for democracy in Swaziland, Africa's last absolute monarchy
during a Norwegian-sponsored meeting held in South Africa and
featuring diplomats and Swazi pro-democracy groups.
2010 Sep 8, Belgian police say
10 people have been arrested in raids across Europe against hackers
who put illegal copies of movies and television series on the
Internet. Police said 5 arrests were in Belgium and the other
arrests were made in Poland, Norway and Sweden, where the alleged
leaders of four computer piracy networks were being held.
2010 Sep 15, Russia and Norway
ended a 40-year dispute in signing an Arctic border treaty which
opens the door to offshore oil and gas exploration. President Dmitry
Medvedev and Norway's PM Jens Stoltenberg presided over the signing
2010 Oct 10, Norwegian oil firm
Statoil is expanding further its shale gas operations in the United
States, saying it has created a joint venture with Canada's Talisman
to acquire acreage on the Eagle Ford prospect in Texas for $1.325
2010 Nov 4, The UN named
oil-rich Norway as the country with the best quality of life, while
Asia has made the biggest strides in recent decades. Australia, New
Zealand, the United States and Ireland followed at the top of the
standings. Zimbabwe came in last among the 169 nations ranked,
behind Mozambique, Burundi, Niger and Democratic Republic of Congo.
2010 Nov 18, The Norwegian
Nobel Committee Russia, Kazakhstan, Cuba, Morocco, Iraq and China
have declined to attend the December 10 Nobel Peace Prize ceremony
for jailed Chinese dissident Liu Xiaobo. 16 more countries had not
replied by the committee's extended deadline. An award spokesman
said the Nobel Peace Prize may not be handed out this year because
no one from imprisoned Liu Xiaobo's family is likely to attend the
2010 Dec 7, In Norway Nobel
officials said China and 18 other countries have declined to attend
this year's Nobel Peace Prize ceremony honoring imprisoned Chinese
dissident Liu Xiaobo, as China unleashed a new barrage deriding the
2010 Dec 10, Dignitaries in
Norway celebrated this year's Nobel Peace Prize winner, imprisoned
Chinese dissident Liu Xiaobo, with an empty chair. Xiaobo,
derided by Beijing as a political farce, dedicated it from his
prison cell to the "lost souls" of the 1989 Tiananmen Square
(AP, 12/10/10)(Reuters, 12/10/10)
2010 Dec 10, Serbia reversed
its boycott of the Nobel Peace Prize ceremony honoring imprisoned
Chinese dissident Liu Xiaobo after facing sharp criticism from the
EU and human rights activists at home.
2011 Jan 18, Negotiators from
the Philippines government and communist rebels agreed to resume
peace talks after informal meetings in Norway.
2011 Feb 15, In Norway
Stolt-Nielsen, founder of the Stolt-Nielsen shipping group, wrote
the following in the financial newspaper Dagens Naeringsliv: "When
(piracy) implies a great risk of being caught and hanged, and the
cost of losing ships and weapons becomes too big, it will decrease
and eventually disappear."
2011 Mar 11, Norway rejected
oil drilling in ecologically se