Norway Seizes Russian Ship to Enforce $4.2B Naftogaz Award

Norway seized a Russian cruise vessel in the Arctic at the demand of Ukrainian state energy group Naftogaz as compensation for asset seizures, the company said on Wednesday. Naftogaz said in a statement that authorities seized the Professor Molchanov in Norway’s Svalbard archipelago under a Norwegian court order. Norwegian newspaper Aftenposten cited a Svalbard police official as confirming the move.JOIN US ON TELEGRAMFollow our coverage of the war on the @Kyivpost_official. The seizure aimed at enforcing an arbitration ruling that ordered Russia to pay around $4.2 billion to Naftogaz for illegally seizing assets following Moscow’s annexation of the Crimea region in 2014. The company’s acting chief executive Sergiy Fedorenko in the statement called the Norwegian move “another important step towards restoring justice” over the seizures. “We will continue to pursue Russian assets around the world until the compensation awarded to Naftogaz and other companies in the Naftogaz group has been paid in full,” he said. Vessel-tracking website VesselFinder indicated that the Professor Molchanov was anchored at Barentsburg, a mining settlement.