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Norway Will Build a Fence at Its Arctic Border With Russia

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Hazmat

Member
660 feet long and 11 feet high. A couple of football fields one foot higher than an NBA hoop. I've driven past businesses with more extensive fencing.
 

Gorger

Member
cfc28bb5-0994-4975-affa-62b0d33c62c5


Here is the path they were taking to get to Norway. When they arrive at Murmansk they buy a bike and ride the rest of the way to Norway through a border crossing region called Storskog. When they arrive some of them were sendt back to Russia who just dismissed them back to Norway again and so it repeated like they were pingpong balls. It's just a shitty situation all around and a horrible experience for the refugees.

Here is the Border between Russia-Norway (right-most area)
Norway_Finnmark_adm_location_map.svg


The county of Finnmark which is the upper northern part of Norway has a population of 75 000 people.
 
Nope. Sovereignty is the right of a nation state. Free movement across borders is not a human right.

Is sovereignty worth human lives?

This is a really narrow view of sovereign borders. All they are is lines drawn on a map. Some people dispute them, or claim they don't exist. It's not preordained that borders are where they are, and they are not immutable or almighty.

And, well, there are hordes of people going from country to country, many fleeing war and adverse conditions.. Try and stop them. Sovereignty only matters as much as one's capability to enforce it. It's no right by any means.

Sometimes amnesty despite illegality may be the right choice.
What do you do with the immigrans? Ship all of them away? Put them in camps?
Walls will have minimal effect, and are as easy to bypass as a ladder.
 

Pancake Mix

Copied someone else's pancake recipe
These rights don't negate each other.

Yes they do. Exercising sovereignty means controlling your borders. The fact is that Norway already relinquished sovereignty within the Schengen Area, but they're not about to do it for Russia.

And again, there's no human right to enter a different country that may not want you there.
 

Gorger

Member

No NATO country wants a border with Russia

Hehe I am Norwegian. Russia is probably the biggest threat to Norway's national security, even though that threat is extremely marginal. Norway is completely dependent on NATO as a safety deterrent to guarantee security of our border. Without NATO Russia could hypothetically just roll over us without even breaking a sweat.
 

Pancake Mix

Copied someone else's pancake recipe
Hehe I am Norwegian. Russia is probably the biggest threat to Norway's national security, even though that threat is extremely marginal. Norway is completely dependent on NATO as a safety deterrent to secure its border.

Nothing wrong with that, my country is also dependent on NATO for security.
 

Dalibor68

Banned
Exercising their right to control entry. It's a good move.
Not just a right but even an obligation as a Schengen country with an non-schengen outer border.

And it's not "syrian refugees". Some of them are. The biggest groups are from Afghanistan, Pakistan, Bangladesh. Most of them being young men. Which doesn't mean they are worth less but it does harbor demographic danger and also I'm sick of this "But the poor syrian children" narrative, when every statistic/reallife experience/border lifestream shows a COMPLETELY different reality.

That said it's completely pointless arguring about this topic with someone who relativizes borders/sovereign countries by saying "b-but it's just lines on a map!".
 
Yes they do. Exercising sovereignty means controlling your borders. The fact is that Norway already relinquished sovereignty within the Schengen Area, but they're not about to do it for Russia.

And again, there's no human right to enter a different country that may not want you there.
You're making little sense. Continuing to not have a fence would not be relinquishing sovereignty, they'd be reclaiming it, if at all, by building this fence.
Exercising sovereignty doesn't require closing off borders, having the option to do so is sovereignty already.

I mean actually reading the article it really seems to be a rather non issue the right can rally behind with big words.
 

Pancake Mix

Copied someone else's pancake recipe
You're making little sense. Continuing to not have a fence would not be relinquishing sovereignty, they'd be reclaiming it, if at all, by building this fence.
Exercising sovereignty doesn't require closing off borders, having the option to do so is sovereignty already.

I mean actually reading the article it really seems to be a rather non issue the right can rally behind with big words.

Hang on, you really think they'd have more control if they didn't close the border? That makes no sense. I don't think we can see eye to eye on this, but if it discourages anyone it's a good move.

You're playing mental gymnastics with the term sovereignty, by its very definition it requires authority.
 

Pancake Mix

Copied someone else's pancake recipe
No I said they would not have less control as you implied in your post.

Yes they would have less control. You're just trying to have your cake and eat it too. Again, sovereignty is about "supreme power or authority." Control over who enters your country by discouraging illegal migration objectively makes it easier to exercise that authority.

There's not really anything more I can say...
 
Yes they would have less control. You're just trying to have your cake and eat it too. Again, sovereignty is about "supreme power or authority." Control over who enters your country by discouraging illegal migration objectively makes it easier to exercise that authority.

There's not really anything more I can say...

I'm not comparing the situations of fence and no fence and which would have more control.

You said they are not about to relinquish border control to Russia, but they were never about to give it up. If the status quo remained unchanged as in no fence were to be erected, their sovereignty would remain identical.
 

Pancake Mix

Copied someone else's pancake recipe
I'm not comparing the situations of fence and no fence and which would have more control.

You said they are not about to relinquish border control to Russia, but they were never about to give it up. If the status quo remained unchanged as in no fence were to be erected, their sovereignty would remain identical.

No, if 5,500 migrants slipped through that way last year, this will be a bit of a discouragement to that happening again. You're acting like the fence has absolutely no use, while ignoring geography and the fact that migrants can't exactly carry a 12 foot ladder on their back.

Norway's border is close to a relatively populated Murmansk in Russia. It's also no real loss to close that border.
 

O.v.e.rlord

Banned
Yeah, just more proof that people are animals. Norway is well within their right to pick and choose who they want to allow in.



Oh give me a break, for one thing the US border with Mexico is enormous, Mexico is an ally, there are already a plethora of illegal Central American immigrants in the US, and for some reason that idiot thinks he can get that ally to pay for it. Also, he legitimately believes that most Mexicans aren't worthy of becoming Americans, which is not the right point of view. If it were small enough a border to be possible, he admitted that the US would pay for the fortifications, and had been more diplomatic, it would have been a good idea, but it's just not practical in 2016, there's way too much opposition and it'd be too expensive to make reliably.

Russia is an enemy of Norway (a member of NATO and the Schengen Region) and it's a tiny border. Also, no thanks to thousands of Syrian migrants who won't mesh with the mostly homogeneous Norwegian society. Norway should be able to let in and refuse who they want, that's sovereignty.

Additionally, Norway is probably the most reluctant Schengen Region member and not a member of the EU. Don't tell them what to think or make parallels with a very different region.




It's not surprising. There's no reason to assume unvetted migrants (many of whom are unattached males as it's easiest for them) are a good thing to bring in.

Dam good expaination. Learned something new.
 
That said, a wall likely wouldn't solve the problem, and just waste money.

Not to mention the humanitarian angle.
These are People, regardless of their illegal status.
Especially if they're REFUGEES. They aren't there for a vacation.

These "refugees", do they go home when the war is over?

How come they don't stay and fix their own country? Fight for what is theirs? There isn't enough resources, jobs or homes for all of Syria just to up and move into Europe. Single, young men should be there .... irony being that eventually the young men of some other nation will go and die in their stead to fix the problem.

If we take some, then why not all?


The rights of the poor and destitute within our own borders should be the priority, we have not been able to solve those problems and those numbers are small relatively compared to the number of refugees and economic migrants seeking to take advantage of the lifestyle afforded by the hard work of those that have had a hand in building and contributing to it.

What kind of slap in the face is it to the poor and homeless already here that we don't all jump up and fix things for them but do so for others from half the world away?


Its just an example of the hypocrisy of those that would have us just help everyone, just don't ask awkward questions or we will besmirch you with some name or label.

And they wonder why Trump ever got a platform, why brexit happened or why the far right is on the rise across Europe.
 

Gorger

Member
Also take into consideration that it's imperative that they go through the proper channels because Finnmark is not densely populated. It's actually the largest and least populated county of Norway (it's even larger than Denmark!). It got huge open areas which is easy to get lost in, and it will get extremely cold with unpredictable weather and generally harsh nature. When thousands of immigrants are coming in unchecked it can be extremely difficult to guarantee their wellbeing if they have no control over them. They have never been in such a situation before, so one must understand that it can be very trying when so many new people arrive in such a short period of time.
 
These "refugees", do they go home when the war is over?

How come they don't stay and fix their own country? Fight for what is theirs? There isn't enough resources, jobs or homes for all of Syria just to up and move into Europe. Single, young men should be there .... irony being that eventually the young men of some other nation will go and die in their stead to fix the problem.

If we take some, then why not all?


The rights of the poor and destitute within our own borders should be the priority, we have not been able to solve those problems and those numbers are small relatively compared to the number of refugees and economic migrants seeking to take advantage of the lifestyle afforded by the hard work of those that have had a hand in building and contributing to it.

What kind of slap in the face is it to the poor and homeless already here that we don't all jump up and fix things for them but do so for others from half the world away?


Its just an example of the hypocrisy of those that would have us just help everyone, just don't ask awkward questions or we will besmirch you with some name or label.

And they wonder why Trump ever got a platform, why brexit happened or why the far right is on the rise across Europe.

Brexit was more to do with the perception of EU workers taking all the jobs, not asylum seekers. Though there was a fair share of fearmongering relating to them, tbh

If anything discouraging people from making a long, life threatening journey after being sold false hopes of how great life automatically will be in Europe may well be the more humane thing to do. The northern wilderness seems like a harsh, harsh place to be in. The UN and the world should be doing as much as they can to keep Syrians safe round in the neighboring countries. I on a personal level still feel some empathy towards them because they haven't been dealt good hands in the lottery of life, and likely will never be able to come to Europe via other channels because of the lack of opportunities and education. But can't they seek refuge in neighboring Arab countries like Jordan instead? They'll be much happier there because they're more familiar with the place, etc.
 

KonradLaw

Member
Walls will have minimal effect, and are as easy to bypass as a ladder.

Walling off the borders have worked really well in Europe against migrant crisis. Everywhere they're put the flood of migrants is reduced to petite stream.
You can't stop everyone from crossing, but with fences you can make it a lot harder. In result fewer people get in and those that do are mostly then captured and shipped back to the other side of the border.
 

brian577

Banned
cfc28bb5-0994-4975-affa-62b0d33c62c5


Here is the path they were taking to get to Norway. When they arrive at Murmansk they buy a bike and ride the rest of the way to Norway through a border crossing region called Storskog. When they arrive some of them were sendt back to Russia who just dismissed them back to Norway again and so it repeated like they were pingpong balls. It's just a shitty situation all around and a horrible experience for the refugees.

Here is the Border between Russia-Norway (right-most area)
Norway_Finnmark_adm_location_map.svg


The county of Finnmark which is the upper northern part of Norway has a population of 75 000 people.

I will never understand this. These people are refugees but they act like they're shopping for a new car. Any stable country has to be better than a war torn nation. Why this need to find the promised land?
 

Weckum

Member
It's kind of ironic that when the Soviet Union built a wall to keep the refugees of East Berlin from fleeing to West Berlin everyone in the West was like 'OMG, how DARE they'. Now it's like 'cool'.
 
You don't need to be physically present in a country to seek asylum in it. So this article does not give you the right to cross borders wherever you want.

yeah they should just write a letter and wait for months while they're being killed in their homes

ez
 

Peru

Member
The current conservative Norwegian government have done their best to ruin as much as possible of what's good about this country
 

danthefan

Member
It's kind of ironic that when the Soviet Union built a wall to keep the refugees of East Berlin from fleeing to West Berlin everyone in the West was like 'OMG, how DARE they'. Now it's like 'cool'.

Other than there's a wall involved the two situations couldn't possibly be more different.

Are Norway building this to keep people in their undemocratic hell hole of a country? Are they totally cutting off land access to half a city? Are they going to shoot on sight anyone who tries to cross?
 

fantomena

Member
Excellent. The more control we have of our own borders, the better. Im for tkaing refugees in btw, but Im also for that we control our borders well.
 

Shiggy

Member
It's kind of ironic that when the Soviet Union built a wall to keep the refugees of East Berlin from fleeing to West Berlin everyone in the West was like 'OMG, how DARE they'. Now it's like 'cool'.

And the prize for the dumbest comparison goes to Weckum. Congratulations!

The Berlin Wall was created by the GDR to keep people within their country, not to prevent people from other countries to enter. Also, Norwegian border patrol will not shoot civilians who try to cross the border. But yup, totally the same.



On a different note, how are Syrian refugees treated in Russia? Is it that bad or is it just like the "let's all move to Germany and Sweden, it's best there"?
 

Oriel

Member
This is probably more about Norway bolstering its border with Russia than immigration, even if Oslo isn't too keen on admitting it.
 
660 feet of fence isn't exactly closing off your border. More like: Guys, you need to go past that checkpoint over there and line up instead of going around it.
 

Oriel

Member
It's kind of ironic that when the Soviet Union built a wall to keep the refugees of East Berlin from fleeing to West Berlin everyone in the West was like 'OMG, how DARE they'. Now it's like 'cool'.

Yeah, because modern Schengen border controls shoot migrants dead when they attempt to enter Europe. :rolleyes:
 

Polari

Member
Are you saying Norwegians are not helping with the crisis... like at all? We've pledged 1,2 billions which is $240 per person based on population (5 million). To compare U.K have pledged $26 per person based on population, Germany $32 and US have $16.

image


I've never even heard of this fence from any major Norwegian news outlets, but it sounds pretty useless and unnecessary. There was one period where thousands of people fled to Norway from Russia, but now it's almost none.

It also doesn't help that we have a rightwing-ish government either.

In context though, you do have a pension fund worth $171,715 per citizen.
 

FyreWulff

Member
It is essentially one of the cheapest ways for refugees/immigrants to get into Europe, although the journey is certainly a very roundabout way to get there.

As for the bicycles themselves, people cannot cross the border on foot and those providing rides to people without documentation are running into trouble. As a result, refugees/immigrants are making use of a policy that allows people to enter the country on a wheeled vehicle (honestly, I can't remember the specific terms but something like this). They buy bicycles in horrendous condition on the Russian side, wheel over the border, then dump them as the bicycles do not meet regulation in Norway.

The business has been booming so much that there is an actual bicycle shortage in the towns near the border. People are piling up there waiting for more bicycles to arrive, while many try to illegally jump the border anyway.

Obviously, there is a greater issue here that I don't want to detract from. I just remember seeing the pictures from this region of pile after pile of bicycles and it stuck with me. I haven't personally seen anything quite like that before.

I'll admit

That's pretty goddamn clever
 

Aureon

Please do not let me serve on a jury. I am actually a crazy person.
Guys it's a 200 meter fence on a 200km border.
Imho there's something beyond that. I had read they're renovating the entire border checkpoint because it can't handle capacity, and that seems more likely.
Because a 200 meter fence is not going to stop fucking anyone, much less refugees that did some 200km on a bike at glacial temperatures.
 

Dalibor68

Banned
In context though, you do have a pension fund worth $171,715 per citizen.
Your point being what exactly? That pension fund probably doesn't come out of nowhere, people and society as a whole work their lives long to get a proper pension (and in non-scandinavia often only get a low pension on which you can barely survive, especcially retired women are often hit very hard by it), why should they give even more away from that when they're already giving 7-8x more than Germany (who ironocally seem to feel like the moral compass of europe though, while at the same time having their highest weapon exports last year). Wrong tree to bark at.
 

Famassu

Member
These "refugees", do they go home when the war is over?
Some might, most probably won't. And no need to use dumb quotation marks. If someone is not an actual refugee, they won't get asylum.


How come they don't stay and fix their own country? Fight for what is theirs? There isn't enough resources, jobs or homes for all of Syria just to up and move into Europe. Single, young men should be there .... irony being that eventually the young men of some other nation will go and die in their stead to fix the problem.
And how do you think they do that? This isn't like Finland vs. Soviet Union in WW2 where there is a single united & militarily trained nation against an outward thread. The situation in Syria & elsewhere in the region is extremely muddled and the common folk aren't in a position to do all that much about ISIS' dirty & relentless mass delusions. Who do you fight against & with? ISIS is the immediate threat, but even if they win against ISIS there are still dictators, other terrorist groups & such that will make life hell no matter what the situation. It's all good to tell other people to fight when you've lived your whole life coddled in the safety of the western world. Your lack of empathy is just baffling.

You're all "fix your own damn problems" now, but let's not forget how Norway declared neutrality & let Germany occupy them, had a lot of your people take refuge elsewhere and only got rid of Nazis with the help of the allied AND Soviet forces in World War II. Where was Norwegians' "fix your own problems" attitude then? IIRC tens of thousands of Norwegians fled the country to Sweden alone, at a time when Sweden wasn't nearly as wealthy as it is now and resources were suffering due to the worldwide war.

If we take some, then why not all?
No reason to bring up dumb & unrealistic "nightmare scenarios" into this argument. Not all of Syria will ever even be able to escape their situation, so it's just needless hysteria to bring it up as if that is something that could realistically happen.

The rights of the poor and destitute within our own borders should be the priority, we have not been able to solve those problems and those numbers are small relatively compared to the number of refugees and economic migrants seeking to take advantage of the lifestyle afforded by the hard work of those that have had a hand in building and contributing to it.
These problems aren't mutually exclusive. You can help refugees and the poor of your country at the same time, especially a rich-as-fuck country like Norway. If there are problems with your own poor people, they arent' because of a few thousand refugees, but the selfish-as-fuck right wing dicks not giving enough of a shit about them to do anything about them (with or without a refugee crisis). There's no political will to help your own people in need. That's not on the refugees, it's on your own selfish asses.

Your argument is such ignorance. Norway & other European countries are far wealthier now than a hundred years ago or during the big wars. If you "can't" take care of your own people, it's because all that wealth is held by a diminishingly small portion of the population and there is no (wide enough) political will to do anything about it. These countries have been able to take care of their poor perfectly well when they had only a fraction of the wealth they possess now, yet somehow when that wealth has increased almost exponentially, suddenly we don't have the ability to do so anymore. Refugees are not at fault here.

What kind of slap in the face is it to the poor and homeless already here that we don't all jump up and fix things for them but do so for others from half the world away?
Because these people are (potentially) refugees who have the internationally recognized rights to get help in their time of need. And we aren't "fixing things" for them, we are providing humanitarian aid for people who are escaping regions of war & general unrest.


Its just an example of the hypocrisy of those that would have us just help everyone, just don't ask awkward questions or we will besmirch you with some name or label.

And they wonder why Trump ever got a platform, why brexit happened or why the far right is on the rise across Europe.
The logic in this quote is just.... o*\ Why do you think that the people who are advocating for the humanitarian aid for refugees/asylum seekers are laughing at the poor in their own country and don't want to help them as well? It's the right wing assholes who prevent poor people from getting (more) help, not the people who want all kinds of people in need to get the help that they need, no matter if they won the lottery of being born in a safe country like Norway or had the unfortunate luck to be born in a (then to-be, now current) hell hole like Syria. If society actually distributed it's wealth even semi-equally, we'd have plenty of money to go around for everyone.


And the far right are on the rise because people from all over are so fucking dumb, ignorant and selfish.

This is probably more about Norway bolstering its border with Russia than immigration, even if Oslo isn't too keen on admitting it.
As if a 11 feet tall wall is gonna do fuck all about Russia's hypothetical aggressions towards Norway.
 
As if a 11 feet tall wall is gonna do fuck all about Russia's hypothetical aggressions towards Norway.
At 660 feet wide it is also going to do fuck all against refugees trying to enter the country.

Looks more like just getting the place in order instead of trying to keep people out.
 

KonradLaw

Member
And we aren't "fixing things" for them, we are providing humanitarian aid for people who are escaping regions of war & general unrest.

The problem is that it's bassicaly throwing money into a fire, a nice gesture, but incredibly inefficent and done by people who care more about how good about themselves they can feel than of creating actual good in the world.

Those people who come to Norway aren't escaping from war, because they've passed multiple safe countries along the way. And they're usually young, strong and rich (by their own countries' standards, because smugglers aren't cheap). And helping them costs insane ammount of money.

Even rich Europe has limits of how much it can spend. And Norwegian authorities have calculated that for what it costs to help on migrant in Norway they could help 27 in camps in middle-east and people there generally need that help far more than those who manage to enter Norway on their own.
 
The problem is that it's bassicaly throwing money into a fire, a nice gesture, but incredibly inefficent and done by people who care more about how good about themselves they can feel than of creating actual good in the world.

Those people who come to Norway aren't escaping from war, because they've passed multiple safe countries along the way. And they're usually young, strong and rich (by their own countries' standards, because smugglers aren't cheap). And helping them costs insane ammount of money.

Even rich Europe has limits of how much it can spend. And Norwegian authorities have calculated that for what it costs to help on migrant in Norway they could help 27 in camps in middle-east and people there generally need that help far more than those who manage to enter Norway on their own.

We are not even close to those limits, though. Sweden is fine, Germany is fine and both of them have taken in far more refugees per capita than countries like Norway (or the UK, France, Spain etc. etc. etc.).
 
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