Growing political tensions, a need for partnerships and the importance of including Indigenous leaders in policy decisions were some of the themes at the Arctic Encounter Summit in Anchorage last week.
More than 700 participants, including leaders from around the circumpolar North, gathered at the Dena’ina Civic and Convention Center for the conference.
Mike Sfraga is a former U.S. ambassador to the Arctic who recently stepped into the interim chancellor role at University of Alaska Fairbanks. He spoke about how national, personal and environmental security are interconnected, especially for people who live in the Arctic.
“We're talking about water security, food security, community security, health security. So it's all nested in there,” Sfraga said. “But it's highlighted by, obviously, our homeland and national security.”
Ties and tensions with Russia
The geopolitical climate in the Arctic has undergone a major shift since Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022. Margaret Williams, a senior fellow with the Arctic Initiative of the Harvard Kennedy School, said that it put an end to partnerships between Russia and the U.S. on wildlife research and planning for potential oil spills.
“Since that time, all of this important collaboration and communication has stopped,” Williams said.
Russia has also been strengthening its relationship with China while growing its shipping, fishing and military activities in the Arctic, Williams said — all of which have increased tensions with the U.S..
Vera Kingeekuk Metcalf is the executive director of the Eskimo Walrus Commission. She was born in Savoonga, a small village on St. Lawrence Island in the Bering Sea, which is closer to eastern Russia than it is to the rest of the U.S. Metcalf said Savoonga residents have a lot in common with their Russian neighbors.
“We have neighbors across the waters in Chukotka sharing the same concerns with Alaskans,” Metcalf said. “We know that we have the same issues that we're dealing with, especially with marine mammal migration patterns changing because of climate change. Our coastlines are eroding, cliffs are crumbling, really challenging our community harvesters, affecting our food systems.”
Metcalf said she hopes that with time, Russian and American scientists and locals will collaborate again to protect marine subsistence resources and exchange cultural knowledge.
“As long as we focus on people-to-people, community-to-community ways — communicating with our neighbors,” Metcalf said.
Need for cooperation
The Arctic Encounter brought representatives from 27 nations to Anchorage. Some came from the European Union, Japan, Canada and Greenland.
During the final day of the conference, Sen. Lisa Murkowski acknowledged there is also friction between the U.S. and Western Arctic countries. Murkowski said the White House’s focus on tariffs and rhetoric around expansion hasn’t helped to build trust and diplomatic partnerships — President Donald Trump has talked about annexing Greenland and about Canada becoming the 51st state.
Murkowski said what can be helpful is having other officials who articulate the country’s priorities differently.
“It's important to have elected representatives who can talk about the important relationships that we want to have with Canada, with Greenland, without suggesting that it has to be adversarial, confrontational or exploitative,” Murkowski said. “We cannot maintain a zone of peace if we erode the circle of trust and treat even our closest allies and friends like a common enemy.”
Murkowski said she sees examples of international collaboration in the Arctic in wildfire management. She said other examples are strengthening defense through military training and the inclusion of Sweden and Finland into the North Atlantic Treaty Organization.
“We have now a new task on the U.S. side, and that is to work to rebuild trust and relations, not with Russia, which has shown that it deserves neither, but with our fellow Western Arctic nations, our closest allies and our long standing partners,” she said. “My commitment is to ensure that America is a reliable partner, will be a reliable partner, so that in the Arctic, we can all advance together.”
Listening to Indigenous people of the North
Several Arctic Encounter panels focused on sovereignty. Speakers agreed that policy decisions about the Arctic should go hand-in-hand with listening to local communities.
Sara Cohen is a deputy head of mission at the Canadian Embassy in the U.S., where she focuses on foreign policy and national security.
“You can't have safe people without having a safe environment. You can't have safe people without them having a safe and secure access to a future that is characterized by dignity in Canada,” Cohen said. “That's very much also part of our reconciliation with Indigenous peoples.”
Doreen Leavitt is the director of natural resources at the Iñupiat Community of the Arctic Slope, a tribal entity representing several communities on the North Slope. Leavitt said people living in the Arctic can represent themselves best.
“When decisions are made about us, we are diminished, and when we the tribes are ignored, it directly erodes our self determination and our sovereignty,” Leavitt said. “At the end of the day, no one else is going to know what is best for our people and our lands than we do.”
After the three-day conference in Anchorage, Arctic Encounter participants visited Fairbanks. The event repeats annually.
