The Center Party’s Bjørn Arild Gram has been appointed the new Minister of Defense. His party colleague Sigbjørn Gjelsvik will take over as the new Minister of Local Government and Districts.
After a short meeting at the Palace, Gram and Gjelsvik walked out on the Palace Square (Slottsplassen) together with Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Støre.
Despite the Easter holidays, a large number of people gathered at Slottsplassen to greet them.
Odd Roger Enoksen (Sp) resigned as Minister of Defense after it was revealed this weekend that he had a relationship with a woman in her late teens when he was around 50 years old.
Cabinet reshuffle
Enoksen will thus be replaced by party colleague Gram, who has been Minister of Local Government and District Affairs since last autumn.
Sigbjørn Gjelsvik (SP) will fill the position of Minister of Local Government and District Affairs after Gram. Up to April, he has been the fiscal policy spokesman for the Center Party.
Source: © NTB Scanpix / #Norway Today / #NorwayTodayNews
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According to NTB, Gram has apologized for a “rude” e-mail sent to moderate Liv Signe Navarsete in 2016 by Center Party members, apparently because she had bravely raised question about Norway getting involved (however peripherally) in the Syrian War with little or no legislative oversight discussion. (Is Norway, still?)
PM Støre specifically discussed this incident with Gram.
Gram claims he had nothing to do with it which may be true, but with Norway’s extremely advanced cyber capabilities, the identity(s) of those responsible must be known.
Presumably this was a factor in Liv Signe leaving Parliament, and we badly need her in Parliament at this very moment.
Where in Gram’s priorities regarding now desperately needed civil defense/sivillforsvars?
At the bottom as usual?
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Meanwhile, NATO is about to add Finland to membership in June.
Considering Putin’s current state of mind, this is extremely foolish. Putin is from St. Petersburg, and this is far too close to home. As well, last I heard Putin’s chief of staff Vaino is the son of the last Estonian communist party leader.
Finland just declaring itself strictly neutral would be far safer for everyone.
Note that it is Putin’s personal spokesman Peskov warning Finland, not Foreign Minister Lavrov.
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And now mass graves have been found *east* of Kyiv.
This is like the 1940 Katyn Massacre. (My history masters thesis about it as a Cold War issue is free to read on ibiblio on the Net.) The identity of every victim must be determined and the circumstances of their deaths investigated. Sad, grisly work for forensic teams.
One renegade military or security unit (Russian or Ukrainian) could have explained Bucha and the killings west of Kyiv. Now, this looks like calculated political terror and extermination.
Whoever the guilty are, they should be identified and prosecuted … like our own high level war criminals were for Iraq, Libya, and Syria?
Meanwhile, Western war crimes whistleblower Julian Assange still seems literally doomed to be sent to the States … in no small part because the Nobel Peace Committee turned their backs on him.
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Again, this holocaust war and our (families’) extremely dangerous situation did not need to happen at all, if we the West had instead just given the Russians the fair security treaty we owe them, after all our aggressive moves against them.
And the terminal melting of Earth’s ice cubes continues to accelerate, thanks to our war-war misdirection and resulting international inaction.
For grownups, not a happy Easter at all. I hope our kids can have one.