Ladies and gentlemen, it was not in my plan to be here today. My Foreign Minister has been here. My Minister of Trade, Industry and Shipping will be here, but I thought it was appropriate to come by, because we experience, as Jørgen Frydnes said, a moment in history which we need to perceive, and we need to grasp what is really happening around us. 

So I'm basically here to deliver a message of solidarity and understanding of the complexity that this industry is facing. You are in fact more important than in decades. And more exposed than before. 

That matters to us, and I want to signal to you it matters to me. It matters to my government. I just secured a safe transfer out of Iran of our Embassy diplomats. The Embassy is not closed, but they will not be in Teheran. So this is on my mind, and a few reflections on that.

You are more important than in decades. That speaks volumes, because this industry has been very important for Norway through the history, shaping what Norway really is today.

We live, as we say, in the most serious security context since the Second World War. I see there are a number of ambassadors here. I think many countries experience the same.

It is a serious moment, we need to keep our heads cool and take the right decisions. 

I come back to the War in Ukraine. One of my big fears is that what's happening now in the Middle East is pulling a lot of oxygen out of that attention, which is critically important for all of us.

And talking about shipping, see what Ukraine has achieved in the Black Sea. They still have access out of the Black Sea with their goods, and I think from the Norwegian side we know that we have made a certain contribution to that because we, together with United Kingdom, we lead that maritime coalition supporting Ukraine in preserving their freedom of navigation. 

There are tensions in the transatlantic relationship. Let's be honest about it.

There is a message from the United States in voice and in action which is challenging. I maintain, and as I've said to the press, the United States is still Norway's most important ally. They are if you look at the capacities, and if anything up North in Norway, also talking about the sea, cooperation with the U.S. has become closer during the last year, not the other way around.

This is because the High North and the maritime dimension in the North is also Homeland Security for the United States. The nuclear capacity of Russia at the other side of the border is not directed against me, I told President Trump, it is actually directed against you, and I had to show him the map in addition.

We also have this phenomenon of great power competitions. What I would call weaponization of certain team in economic activities. Minerals, energy and trade and now even transport, where countries are using their potential to block or to secure their interests in ways, which are completely new. And there is a challenge against international law and established norms.

Not that they have disappeared. We were reminded in January by DG of WTO that although there is a challenge to world trade, 80 percent of world trade still happens inside the rules of WTO.

But we need to reform WTO and make it relevant to the world in which we live, so when the ministerial meeting of the WTO, I think the Foreign Minister may have mentioned,  Norway takes a part. And who do we work with very closely? Well, Singapore, Canada, countries that are around the world to secure that critical part of world trade.

On the 8. of May, which is a symbolic date in Norway, day of peace, we launched the National Security Strategy. The first one that my country has adopted. There are three key priorities: National defence, national resilience and economic security.

The fact is that for your industry, you are relevant and critical for all of those. Obviously for national defence. It is key for securing the the sea roots, and for national defence in times of crisis, we know historically the role that the civil shipping service has played. The model we have of cooperation between defence and the civil capacity, is still very important.

And for resilience and for economic security. It reminds us that we are a maritime nation.

I had my Canadian colleague here for three days up until the weekend, and I have learned from chatGPT that Norway has the second longest coastline in the world, if you take every dot along the Norwegian coast.

Second only to Canada, so being together with Mark Carney, I think we were reminded that we have a lot in common here, and therefore the importance of our merchant fleet, one of the largest in the world relative to countries population, weighs a lot.

Counts for 30 percent of our total exports and making this sector the second largest after oil and gas, and of course a major source of employment, directly in shipping, shipbuilding and maritime services.

I visited the Ulstein Group last week, and they were delivering from their production two ships. Ultra modern, which are going to serve ocean wind installations along the European coast and the British coast.

The interesting thing about this is that they deliver these high class ships while Norway has still not yet developed is own offshore wind. How can they do that?

Well they can do that, because they build on experience from oil and gas and a complex maritime operations for the last 50 years. An interesting example.

Let me end by focusing on how we now are exposed and how you are exposed, as I read it. I need to teach you no lessons about this.

We live in the world of competition. There is a war on different continents and multiple crisis, but talking a bit of what's happening in the Strait of Hormuz.

Of course, one fifth of global oil is transcrossing out there. You may have ships on the one side and on the other side of the Strait of Hormuz.

And that closure, which is not completely closed, because Iran is letting some ships sail by, it's another complex situation. It is of course a major challenge for you, and it is an unacceptable situation. 

Our position on this war is the following, and I quote the German chancellor, what he said yesterday. It is a war without a mandate from the UN, not from the EU, not from Nato. 

It is a war which has happened without consultation with close allies and partners. That is a fact. 

That being said, the Iranian regime has no friends, not in the region. Not in my region, not in among government. It has plagued its people, terrorized its people, caused crisis and wars around that entire region.

What we see now, I think it's a textbook of escalation of military operation, when there is no detailed plan on how we do phase 2, 3 and 4. 

We have seen that many times before, and that is a concern for us, and it's certainly also a concern for you.

We have been asked, and it has been raised from the American side, to contribute military capacity to the Gulf. Our response is that Norway will not do that for two main reasons.

One is that our military capacity has to be used here, in our close waters up in the North. We have a major military exercise ongoing, and that's where we have to be present.

The other thing is that we don't have the capabilities of fighting that kind of war. Again, it doesn't have a mandate, and this is not about, as we have done in the Red Sea, escorting ships.

It is about really fighting what goes on on the shores. And that message I think have come from a few.

I saw that the President of the U.S. appealed to Nato, at the same time to Japan and China, not members of Nato, I would say, but this is how our response is.

What my fear is is that we are going to see escalation, because this is not a war fought by one country.

There are two countries, Israel and the U.S., and they don't seem to have identical objectives about strategy and how it evolves.

We are seeing a regime, which is digging in, not necessarily eliminated, so appeal for regime change and doing that from the air has never proved easy, which is also, I think, a concern.

So, my concern, dear friends, is that this attack is a further attack also on international law. The Iranian counter attack is also a big challenge to international law and safety at sea, and there's a risk of further escalation with regional and global consequences. 

There's a risk for the states of the Gulf who have a security perspective, which is now being profoundly changed because of the war which is ongoing and again a lack of a clear, plan and success criteria for how to move ahead.

Our message has to be quite simple.

The hostilities have to find a way to stop. There need to be a return to some kind of negotiations.

The challenge right now is that seeing negotiations between the parties involved directly is very hard to conceive for different reasons, so there need to be some kind of third factor.

Some kind of actors who come in, it should normally have been United Nations or regional actors, but this is what we have to hope for.

And Iran must stop attacks against third countries and its unacceptable threats against civilian ships.

So on this and many other contexts we are in together, I appreciate the very close cooperation we have with the Shipowners' Association. 

There's great cooperation between the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, your emergency capacities and how we communicate.

And be assured, we will be on watch.

Supporting you and listening to your concern and trying to make the best out of it. And let's hope that can happen.

It has been repeated sometimes that being an optimist is not easy, because things don't always go well. But being a pessimist is not quite either, because things normally don't go completely wrong.

So let's keep hope, being in the middle, and act well together. Thank you.