f a gala performance. The parliament's
decision to approve construction and funding of a national opera
house belatedly confirmed an overly optimistic 1881 report in an
Oslo newspaper that the capital was about to get a new opera house.
2008 Apr 23, Norway raised its
main interest rate a quarter point to 5.5%.
(WSJ, 4/24/08, p.A8)
2008 May 28, The first winners
of the new Kavli Prizes for outstanding research in nanoscience,
neuroscience, and astrophysics were to be announced in Oslo, Norway.
(SFC, 4/12/08, p.C1)
2008 Jun 9, Russia and Norway
met for 2-days talks in the hope of making progress in a decades-old
dispute over their maritime border in the Barents Sea, a part of the
Arctic that could hold large oil and gas reserves. After visiting
the Norwegian town of Kirkenes, the ministers will go to Murmansk in
2008 Jun 13, Norway said it may
seek foreign help to extinguish its biggest forest fire since World
War Two, which has been raging for five days.
2008 Jun 17, Norway passed a
new equality law granting gay couples the same rights as
heterosexuals to marry, adopt and undergo artificial insemination.
2008 Jul 24, In southern Norway
a group of men armed with bats and iron bars attacked a center for
political asylum-seekers, leaving more than 20 people injured.
2008 Jul, Religious leaders
meeting in Norway unveiled a plan for a code of conduct for holy
sites on which all governments could agree.
2008 Aug 20, A top Russian
general said 64 of the country's soldiers were killed and 323
wounded in this month's fighting with Georgia. Russia informed
Norway that it plans to suspend all military ties with NATO, a day
after the military alliance urged Moscow to withdraw its forces from
(AP, 8/20/08)(AP, 8/21/08)
2008 Sep 16, Norwegian PM Jens
Stoltenberg said Norway will give Brazil US$1 billion by 2015 to
preserve the Amazon rain forest, as long as Latin America's largest
nation keeps trying to stop deforestation.
2008 Oct 10, Finland's
ex-president Martti Ahtisaari won the Nobel Peace Prize for his
efforts to build a lasting peace from Africa and Asia to Europe and
the Middle East. The Norwegian Nobel Committee said it honored
Ahtisaari for important efforts over more than three decades to
resolve international conflicts.
2008 Nov 20, The Norwegian
government said it has picked the US developed F-35 Joint Strike
Fighter to replace its aging US-made F-16 aircraft in a roughly 60
billion kroner ($8.5 billion) deal.
2008 Dec 3-2008 Dec 4, In
Norway 94 nations signed a treaty banning cluster bombs in a move
that supporters hope will shame the US, Russia and China and other
non-signers into abandoning weapons blamed for maiming and killing
civilians. Norway, which began the drive to ban cluster bombs 18
months ago, was the first to sign, followed by Laos and Lebanon,
both hard-hit by the weapons.
(AP, 12/3/08)(Econ, 12/13/08, p.70)
2008 Dec 10, The Nobel Prizes
were awarded in twin ceremonies in Stockholm and Oslo.
2008 Dec, In Norway Think
Global AS, a front runner in the plug-in car market, filed for
Bankruptcy after its failure to get capital financing under the
current credit crunch.
(WSJ, 1/24/09, p.B2)
2009 Jan 11, Arne Naess
(b.1912), Norwegian philosopher, writer and mountaineer, died. He
was best known for launching the concept of "deep ecology,"
promoting the idea that Earth as a planet has as much right as its
inhabitants, such as humans, to survive and flourish.
2009 Jan 23, In northern Norway
an off-duty police officer shot and killed his ex-girlfriend with
another officer's service pistol, then critically wounded himself
outside the elementary school where she was a student teacher.
2009 Jan 26, Norway announced a
20 billion kroner ($2.89 billion) stimulus package to boost growth
(WSJ, 1/27/09, p.A8)
2009 Feb 23, Norwegian
architect Sverre Fehn (b.1924) died in Oslo. His unique style of
blending modern forms with Scandinavian traditions earned him the
prestigious Pritzker Architecture Prize (1997). His white concrete
Glacier Museum (1991), which has been hailed as a landmark within
contemporary architecture. It stand