Two shopping centers promptly sprang up to serve Russians looking for Western clothing, gifts, disposable diapers and alcohol.
“It was a local, regional and national strategy to focus on turning toward Russia,” Mr. Roine said.
More than 266,000 people from Russia crossed the nearby border station into Norway in 2019; last year, that number fell by more than 75 percent.
For decades, the vast amounts of cod in the Barents Sea — home to one of the world’s last surviving stocks of the fish — have drawn people and businesses from both countries to this Arctic Circle community.
Kirkenes’s most important industrial employer is Kimek, a shipbuilding company that has prospered by repairing commercial fishing boats known as trawlers, especially the Russian ones.
Persons:
Russia ’, ” Mr, Roine
Organizations:
Arctic Council
Locations:
Russia, Soviet Union, Norway, Kirkenes