YAKUTSK, February 16. /TASS/. The project office of the Northern Forum international organization of northern regions will open in Khanty-Mansiysk in 2024, the organization's Executive Director Vladimir Vasiliev told TASS.
In 2023, the Northern Forum's General Assembly in Khanty-Manskiysk elected the Khanty-Mansi Autonomous Region (Yugra) the organization's chair for 2023-2025.
"The plan is that in 2024 a project office will be organized in Khanty-Mansiysk," the official said. "We hope that the office will be permanent even after the region's chairing role expires."
Project activities will be transferred to the office, he added. "We will create a fund at the office that will accumulate monies for projects, grant competitions," he said.
The Northern Forum is an international non-governmental organization uniting northern regions' governors. It is viewed as an instrument to expand non-political dialogue between governors of Arctic and northern regions in different countries, as well as between leaders of municipalities and organizations.
The Northern Forum unites regions of the Russian Federation (the Jewish Autonomous Region, the Kamchatka, Krasnoyarsk, Kolyma, Nenets Autonomous Regions, Yakutia, Khabarovsk, Khanty-Mansi, Chukotka, Yamalo-Nenets Autonomous Regions), as well as Alaska (the USA), Gangwon Province (the Republic of Korea), and nine business partners from Russia, Iceland, Norway, the USA, and Japan. Until 2013, the Northern Forum's secretariat was located in Anchorage (Alaska), and currently the office is in Yakutsk.