Authors

Nurlan Aliyev¹;  ¹ College of Europe (Natolin Campus), Poland

Discussion

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine burdens the Russian economy, including its Arctic projects. The projects' targets have already been postponed. In this respect, a question arises whether Moscow may achieve its strategic and geoeconomic goals in the Arctic by its military presence and increasing energy production, especially LNG, increasing the cargo volume in the Northern Sea Route, and building the required icebreakers and ice-class vessels.

Although Moscow tries to attract investments and increase joint projects of Asian and the Gulf countries, the Western sanctions following the invasion of Ukraine heavily challenge the developments of the Russian Arctic projects. In this respect, the thought that Russia’s contemporary foreign policy behavior challenges its economic projects and that the security and economic values of the Arctic are a dilemma for the Kremlin once again is approved. This article explores the current state of the Russian military and economic projects in the Arctic, their challenges, and their perspectives. It also analyses the involvement of the non-Arctic powers, such as China, in the Russian economic projects in the High North.  The information and data from official documents and sources, media reports, discussions in professional groups on social media and telegram channels, and expert interviews (anonymous) are used.