Norway launches campaign to give Finland a mountain

[Ромејац]

Oslo would lose only 0.015 square kilometres if it gave Finland the peak of Halti mountain, say campaigners

 

Halti is on the Norwegian-Finnish border

 

A group of Norwegians has launched a campaign to shift their country's border by 200 metres to bring the peak of the Halti mountain into Finnish territory as a gift to their mountain-deprived neighbour for the 100th anniversary of its independence.

Moving the border between Norway and Finland just 490ft (150m) to the north and 650ft (200m) to the east would bring Finland a new highest peak while losing Norway just 0.015 square kilometres.

At 4,479ft (1,365m), Halti does not even make the list of Norway’s highest 200 peaks. But one of its lower spurs, Hálditšohkka, marks the highest point in Finland, at 4340ft (1,324m).

“My idea is that this should be a gift from the Norwegian people and I feel sure that the Finnish people would appreciate it,” said Bjørn Geirr Harsson, the retired geodesist behind the Facebook campaign.

“It would not change the square kilometre size of Norway or Finland,” Mr Harsson told the Telegraph. “But it would make a big difference that the highest point in Finland would be on a mountain peak and not on a hillside.”

• How sleepy Finland could tear apart the euro project

Judging by the comments on the Facebook page, the gesture would be warmly received.

“The Norwegians would make history and become heroes not just in Finland but in the whole world!” wrote user, Jyrki Veranen.

Mr Harsson, 75, said he first had the idea in 1972 when he was flying along the border measuring gravity, but it was only this summer, when he heard that Finland was preparing to celebrate the 100th year of its independence in 2017, that he decided to act.

The proposal has already won the support, if no commitment from Anne Cathrine Frøstrup, the head of the Norwegian Mapping Authority.

“It is a very good idea,” she told Norway’s state broadcaster NRK after receiving an email from Mr Harsson last week. "It is a nice gift to give to a country that lacks a high mountain, where the highest point isn’t even a peak.”

Markku Markkula, from the Land Survey of Finland told Finland’s Hufvudstadsbladet newspaper that there would be few legal obstacles.

“It would be a question of an agreement between the two countries,” he said.

Mr Harsson sent a letter to the Norwegian foreign ministry this summer, to which he has yet to receive a reply. He also sent a letter to the Norwegian municipality where the mountain is located.

But it was only last week with the launch of the Facebook page that the campaign took off.

“It’s just blown up on the internet,” he said. “In general I would say that the Finnish people have a high regard in Norway and I would expect most Norwegians to support this.”

He suspects it was his son, who works in the technology industry in California, who set up the Facebook page.

 

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/norway/12055542/Norway-launches-campaign-to-give-Finland-a-mountain.html

[Ромејац]

The Norwegian plan to gift Finland a mountain

 

 

If you judge countries purely by their mountainous terrain, Finland is a bit of a loser. Halti, Finland's tallest, is around 1,324 meters, or about 4,340 feet, making it a "one-thousander" as it is over a thousand meters above sea level. That may sound impressive, but bear in mind that the tallest peak in the United States is a six-thousander and Mount Everest is a eight-thousander.

 

To add insult to injury, the mountain's summit is actually in Norway, standing just over 40 meters above the tallest peak in Finland. And worse still, Halti is pretty much irrelevant in Norway – it doesn't even scratch the top 200 highest peaks.

 

Now an online campaign is calling upon the Norwegian government to give Finland a new peak. Dubbing their project "Halti as an anniversary gift," the organizers say that Norway should give Finland the peak of the mountain to celebrate the 100-year anniversary of Finland's declaration of independence from the Russian Republic in 1917.

 

"Let's take Finland to new heights!" the Facebook page for the group, which has just over 2,500 likes, says.

 

The Local, citing Norwegian press reports, says that Bjørn Geirr Harsson is likely the man behind the idea, though even he doesn't know who set up the Facebook page (Harsson suspects it was his son).

 

A 75-year-old former employee of the Norwegian Mapping Authority, Harsson says that he had the idea when flying over the mountain in 1972. “We would not have to give away any part of Norway. It would  barely be noticeable," he said. "And I’m sure the Finns would greatly appreciate getting it."

 

It isn't as dramatic an idea as it may sound – according to Harsson, the border would only need to be moved around 65 feet and it would have little effect on the overall size of Norway.

 

It's unclear at present whether the proposal will gather anymore steam: The current head of the Norwegian Mapping Authority is also said to be on board with the proposal, but Norway's foreign ministry has not yet responded to a letter sent by Harsson earlier this year. The idea has caught attention of some Finns, however, with the official Twitter account of the Finnish Embassy in Norway tweeting a link to a news story about the proposal.

 

Overall, the response seems pretty positive.

 

"This is a brave idea," one commentator wrote on the website of Finnish newspaper Ilta Sanomat. "It will be remembered in Finland for a thousand years."