Norwegian salmon may lead to improved relations between China and Norway

King Harald welcomes China's new Ambassador My Wangoslo.King Harald welcomes China's new Ambassador My Wang in solemn audience at the Palace.Photo: Håkon Mosvold Larsen / NTB scanpix

Six years after the Nobel Prize award lead to a frosty relationship between China and Norway, the salmon trade may lead to the diplomatic relations between the countries thawing.

China’s newly appointed ambassador to Norway, Wang Min,  visited the fish farming companies Gratangslaks and Kleiva Fishery Farm in Troms with Fisheries Minister Per Sandberg (FRP) Friday, and signaled that he was optimistic about and very positive to  increased trade with Norway,  Fiskeribladet Fiskeren writes.

– It’s been six years. The Nobel award ceremony was a blow to the relations between the countries. But now it’s time to get the relation back on track,  a frank Wang Min said.
– If we achieve that, we will become heroes, was Sandberg’s immediate reaction.
China broke all political contact with Norway after the award of the Nobel Peace Prize to Chinese dissident Liu Xiaobo in 2010.

It is especially salmon exports has suffered from the lack of dialogue between the countries.
– We wish to enter into dialogue with the Chinese authorities to clarify what the demands are that now stands in the way for an expanded trade, said the Fisheries Minister, who invited the Chinese ambassador to further talks in Oslo.
On his visit to Troms Wang Min caught a fish for the first time.
– They  cut the head off the fish and threw the head away. That shocked me. Where I’m from, my wife would have made an “excellent” soup of the head, the ambassador said with a smile.

 

Source: NTB scanpix / Norway Today