The United Kingdom announced on Tuesday a new initiative based on artificial intelligence aimed at strengthening its monitoring capabilities in the Arctic and identifying hostile activities by other countries.
A statement from the Foreign Office said that during his visit to the Arctic on Tuesday, Foreign Secretary David Lammy would unveil a new programme between the UK and Iceland.
“As the UK’s two nearest Arctic neighbours and close NATO allies, what happens around Norway and Iceland affects Britain, especially our national security,” the statement said.
It notes that the Arctic is becoming “an increasingly contested area” as countries seek to exploit new reserves of gas, oil and natural resources exposed by melting ice due to rising global temperatures, which are also opening up previously inaccessible shipping routes.
“We cannot bolster the UK’s defence … without greater security in the Arctic,” he said in the statement.
Lammy will become the first British foreign secretary to visit one of the northernmost inhabited points in the Arctic when he travels to the Svalbard archipelago.
According to Lammy, the Arctic is becoming “an increasingly important frontier for geopolitical competition and trade” and it is now “more important than ever for his country to work with allies in the High North such as Norway and Iceland.” Britain and Iceland have agreed to allocate £554,000 to the Alan Turing Institute for development of the AI program.
In addition, the British Foreign Office’s Global Science and Tactical Fund has allocated £400,000 to support scientific co-operation between the UK and Norway in the region.
Lammy will be the first foreign minister to visit the Svalbard archipelago, located deep within the Arctic Circle. He will also visit Keflavik Air Station in Iceland, where Royal Air Force aircraft support NATO air policing missions.
