Like Canada, Russia is an Arctic nation. And like us, their purpose is to establish a greater presence or capability in the north and to improve that capability.
Russia, like Canada, is very much interested in the advantages of increasing its economic capacity in the north through the Northeast Passage, which is increasingly open for navigation across the top of Russia. But the key in the Arctic, in my view, is to apply the principal tenets of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea concerning territorial waters and economic exclusive zones, and that when there is contention, as there was between Norway and Russia in 2009, to negotiate the common ground and reduce any tension that might be building.