 "Ex-NATO chief Jens Stoltenberg named Norway's finance minister")
Former Nato chief Jens Stoltenberg was named Norway’s new finance minister on Tuesday as part of a cabinet reshuffle, stepping into the role at a time when the Nordic nation is concerned about the potential effects of a transatlantic trade war.
The decision to appoint the well-respected and popular Stoltenberg may help boost the struggling Labour government’s standing in opinion polls ahead of the parliamentary elections in September.
A seasoned politician, Stoltenberg served as Norway’s prime minister from 2000 to 2001 and again from 2005 to 2013. He led Nato for a decade, including throughout US President Donald Trump’s first term, before stepping down last year.
His new role brings an experienced negotiator and diplomat into the Norwegian cabinet as the world faces ongoing trade tensions.
“This team is ready to lead Norway in demanding times,” Reuters quoted Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Stoere as saying to reporters outside the Royal Palace after the new cabinet met King Harald.
“We will deliver policies that mean something in people’s everyday lives and (we) are aware of the instability in the world which Norway, as a small country, is affected by,” Stoere added.
At NATO, Stoltenberg was dubbed the “Trump-whisperer” for convincing Donald Trump to stick with the alliance after the US president complained during his first term that allies were spending too little on defence and threatened to pull out.
Non-EU Norway, a country of 5.5 million with an export-oriented economy, fears it could be vulnerable to a transatlantictrade war should Trump go ahead with his threat to impose tariffs on European Union goods. Norway’s main exports are oil, gas and fish.
Impact Shorts
View AllNorway’s eurosceptic Centre Party quit the government on Thursday in a dispute over the adoption of European Union energy policies, leaving the centre-left Labour to rule alone.
Labour has been lagging in polls ahead of the September vote. Stoltenberg was popular among Norwegians during his time at Nato and afterwards and could boost Labour’s prospects.
The 65-year-old is an economist by training and was finance minister in 1996-1997. He is widely seen as a pragmatist centrist.
In 2022, Stoltenberg was due to become Norway’s central bank chief but did not take up the role after then-US President Joe Biden asked him to continue as Nato chief.
During his first stint as PM, Stoltenberg set up the so-called spending rule, a self-imposed rule that says that Norwegian governments should not use more than 4% of the total value of the sovereign wealth fund for national budgets.
That rule has since then been reduced to 3% as the fund has grown in value.
With inputs from agencies
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