Norway

OSLO (Reuters) - Norway aims to reach a free-trade agreement with China by the end of 2020, more than a decade after initial negotiations began, the Norwegian industry minister told Reuters on Wednesday.

“By the end of last year we had good progress in the talks ... we continue to be optimistic and think it is realistic to get a deal in place during the year,” Torbjoern Roe Isaksen told Reuters on the sidelines of an industry conference in Oslo.

OSLO, Nov 21 (NNN-AGENCIES) – A 32-year-old Norwegian, who stole and sped in the streets for 15 minutes in Oslo last month, was charged with five attempted murders, newspaper VG reported.

“He is charged with attempted murders and it concerns an elderly married couple and a mother with pram with twins,” Kari Kirkhorn, police attorney, told VG.

Norwegian police arrested the man on Oct 22, the same day when he drove over a woman with the baby pram, and forced an elderly couple to jump away in front of the car he had hijacked.

OSLO, Nov 5 (NNN-XINHUA) – Nine Filipino crew members were kidnapped from a cargo ship, owned by Norwegian shipping company, J.J. Ugland.

The nine people were taken off the bulk vessel, while it was waiting to be unloaded, off the coast in Benin, according to a statement released by Ugland.

While the company did not mention the nationalities of the hostages, Norwegian online newspaper E24, quoted a source of Norwegian Shipowners’ Association as saying that, they were all Filipinos.

OSLO (Reuters) - China is likely to become the first country in the world to start mining seabed minerals if the international rules for exploitation are approved next year, the head of the International Seabed Authority (ISA) said.

The quest for exploiting seabed minerals, such as polymetallic nodules containing nickel, copper, cobalt and manganese is driven by demand for smart phones and electric car batteries, and the need to diversify supply.

OSLO, Aug 22 (NNN-IRNA) — Chairwoman of the Commission on Foreign Affairs and Defense of the Norwegian Parliament Anniken Huitfeldt said on Thursday that although her country is a close ally of the US, it strongly supports the JCPOA or Iran’s Nuclear deal and promoting trade between Oslo and Tehran.

She added after a meeting with the visiting Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif, “Direct communications between me and the Iranian side was useful and we discussed various issues.”

OSLO (Reuters) - Iran is prepared to work on French proposals to salvage the international nuclear deal that Tehran signed with world powers in 2015 but it will not tolerate U.S. interference in the Gulf, its foreign minister said on Thursday.

At a time of heightened friction between Tehran and Washington, Iran also on Thursday displayed what it described as a domestically built long-range, surface-to-air missile air defense system.

The United State abandoned the international nuclear deal in May last year and stepped up sanctions on the Islamic Republic.

12 August 2019; DW: The 21-year old man is suspected of opening fire in a mosque and breaching anti-terror laws. He has plead not guilty and refused to be interrogated by authorities.

A man held by Norwegian authorities as a suspect in the shooting at the al-Noor Islamic Centre, outside of Oslo, appeared in court on Monday. The 21-year-old is also suspected to have murdered his 17-year-old stepsister.

STOCKHOLM, Aug 12 (NNN-AGENCIES ) – A shooting at a mosque in Norway is being treated as an “attempted act of terrorism,” police said on Sunday, but the male suspect has so far declined to answer police questions.

“He still doesn’t wish to give an explanation,” Grete Lien Metlid, assistant chief of the Oslo police district, told dpa late Sunday.

The suspect, a Norwegian in his early 20s, was arrested in connection with Saturday’s incident at the Al-Noor Islamic Centre mosque in Baerum, west of Oslo.

OSLO, Aug. 10 (Xinhua) -- A dead person was found after the Mosque shooting outside Oslo on Saturday, and it was being investigated in related to the shooting incident, police said late Saturday.

Norwegian public broadcasting company NRK quoted police as saying the area where the dead man was found was blocked off in Baerum, just west of Oslo.

"In the house we have found a dead person whom we put in connection with the case", which happened earlier in Skui, a district in Baerum, said Brian Skotnes of Oslo police.

12 July 2019; DW: A Soviet submarine is leaking radiation into the Norwegian Sea "clearly above what is normal in the oceans." But researchers said it posed no serious threat, saying radiation levels "weren't alarmingly high."

Norwegian researchers on Wednesday said they have documented a radiation leak from a sunken Soviet-era nuclear submarine.