e UN ranked
Norway as the country with the world’s highest standard of living.
PM Jens Stolenberg credited the nation’s welfare system.
(SFC, 7/10/01, p.A8)
2001 Aug 23, The Norwegian
government established the Abel Prize in mathematics in honor of the
Niels Henrik Abel (1802-1829).
2001 Aug 25, In Oslo, Norway,
Crown Prince Haakon (28) married Mette-Marit (28), a single mother
and former waitress.
(SSFC, 8/26/01, p.A16)(AP, 8/25/02)
2001 Sep 10, In parliamentary
elections no party received a majority. The ruling Labor Party had
its worst showing in decades. Labor won 24% of the vote, its worst
showing since 1924 as voters rejected the high-tax funded social
(WSJ, 9/11/01, p.A1)(SFC, 9/11/01, p.B2)
2001 Dec, Vebjorn Sand,
Norwegian artist, completed a 330-foot bridge linking Norway and
Sweden at Aas, 16 miles south of Oslo. The design was based on plans
drawn up by Leonardo da Vinci in 1502.
(SSFC, 12/9/01, p.C2)(WSJ, 11/5/05, p.P12)
2001 Braathens, a Norwegian
airline, was taken over by the SAS Group, partly owned by the
governments of Sweden, Denmark and Norway. It merged with SAS in
2001 Ansar al-Islam, blamed for
attacks in Iraq and supported by a network of members in Europe, was
founded in late 2001 in Kurdish part of northern Iraq by Mullah
Krekar, who had lived as refugee in Norway since 1991.
2002 Jan, Per-Kristian Foss,
the Conservative finance minister, married Jan Erik Knarbakk. This
was the 1st legal gay partnership by a member of the Norwegian
(SFC, 1/16/02, p.A7)
2002 Feb 21, Sri Lanka approved
a Norwegian long-term cease-fire plan already approved by Tamil
(SFC, 2/22/02, p.A13)
2002 Mar, The condo-resort
ship, The World, first set sail from Oslo, Norway. The $280 million,
12-deck cruise ship ran into financing problems and was sold Oct 31,
2003, for $71 million to a residents' partnership.
(WSJ, 2/20/04, p.A1)
2002 Apr 18, Thor Heyerdahl
(87), Norwegian head of the 1947 Kon-Tiki voyage, died in northern
(SFC, 4/19/02, p.A2)
2002 Dec 14, The Norwegian
Tricolor, a cargo ship carrying nearly 2,900 luxury cars capsized
and sank after colliding with the Bahamas-registered Kariba cargo
ship in the English Channel. Tricolor carried 2,862 cars, high-end
BMWs, Volvos and Saabs, and 77 other items, mainly tractors and
large crane parts.
2003 Jan 28, US and Afghan
forces battled rebels aligned with renegade leader Gulbuddin
Hekmatyar in the largest-scale fighting in 10 months. 18 enemy
fighters were killed in 2 days of fighting. Norwegian F-16s
participated in bombing enemy targets.
(AP, 1/28/03)(WSJ, 1/29/03, p.A1)(SFC, 1/29/03,
2003 Mar 20, Norwegian police
arrested Mullah Krekar, the leader of a Kurdish guerrilla group
suspected of links to al-Qaida, on kidnapping charges. After
settling in Norway in 1991, Krekar founded the Kurdish Ansar
al-Islam during visits to Iraq.
(AP, 3/20/03)(AP, 2/14/12)
2003 Aug 22, Oslo, Norway, was
ranked the world's most expensive city by Swiss banking giant UBS.
It was followed by New York, Zurich, Switzerland; Copenhagen,
Denmark; London; Basel, Switzerland; Chicago; and Geneva.
2003 Sep 30, Norway's national
film board lifted a ban on hundreds of films that were deemed too
sexually explicit or violent, including 1994's "On Deadly Ground"
starring Steven Seagal and the 1990 gangster epic "Miller's
2003 Dec 10, The Nobel Prize
awards ceremony were held in Sweden and Norway. Iranian democracy
activist Shirin Ebadi, the first Muslim woman to win the Nobel Peace
Prize, accepted the award in Oslo, Norway.
(AP, 12/10/03)(AP, 12/10/08)
2003 Dec 12, Keiko the killer
whale (27), whose early life inspired the film "Free Willy," died in
Norway of apparent pneumonia.
(SFC, 12/13/03, p.A1)
2004 Jan 1, In Norway a new law
went into effect to allow foreign hunters to hunt seals. The
legislation raised the seal kill quota to 2,000.
(SFC, 11/27/04, p.A10)
2004 Jan 2, Norwegian police
arrested Mullah Krekar, Muslim Kurd leader of Ansar al-Islam, on
charges connected to 2 suicide bombings in Iraq 2 years ago. Norway
ordered Krekar deported in 2005 after declaring him a national
security threat, but p