Difference between Pakistan and Norway culture?
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Norway in PakistanRoyal Norwegian Embassy in Islamabad
Travel and border information for Norway
Norway-Pakistan Relations
Basic information about the bilateral relations between Norway and Pakistan.
Norway and Pakistan: A Comparison
Norway and Pakistan have good and close relations, but are two very different countries. Norway is a country with a Christian-humanist heritage located in northern Europe and Pakistan is a mainly Muslim country in South Asia. The distance between the capitals, Oslo and Islamabad, is 5,300 km. The geographical area of Norway is 385,000 km2 and that of Pakistan about 882,000 km2. Norway has some 5.2 million inhabitants, whereas about 208 million people live in Pakistan. Norway is a rich developed country and Pakistan is a middle-income developing country. According to the World Bank, Norway’s nominal gross domestic product in 2015 was USD 388 billion, compared to USD 270 billion for Pakistan. The Norwegian GDP per capita in 2015 was USD 74,482 and Pakistan’s USD 1,435.
Diplomatic relations
The bilateral, diplomatic relations between Norway and Pakistan are good. Norway recognized Pakistan as a sovereign state in 1947, shortly after its foundation. For many years, Norway only had an honorary consulate general in Pakistan, located in Karachi. However, in 1976 an embassy was established in Islamabad, headed by an acting ambassador (chargé d’affaires). Norway’s first resident ambassador in Islamabad, Mr Jan Erik Leikvang, arrived in 1995. Today, Norway has honorary consulates in both Karachi and Lahore, in addition to the Embassy in Islamabad.
In recent years, there have been frequent consultations and exchanges of visits between the two countries. Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif visited Oslo in 2015, and Norway’s Foreign Minister Børge Brende visited Islamabad in 2015 and 2016. In April 2017, bilateral consultations between civil servants from the respective foreign ministries took place in Oslo.
The Pakistani diaspora in Norway
Norway and Pakistan have close people-to-people relations. Immigration to Norway from Pakistan started in the late 1960s. However, since 1975, immigration has mostly been allowed only in cases of family reunification or family establishment. Today there are nearly 40,000 persons living in Norway who were either born in Pakistan or both of whose parents were born there.
Most of the Pakistani diaspora in Norway hails from Kharian and elsewhere in the district of Gujrat. They are well integrated in Norwegian society. E.g. their education level and home ownership are close to or above the Norwegian average. Notably many second-generation Norwegian-Pakistani women attend higher education. Quite a number have attained prominent positions in Norwegian political and professional life.
At the Norwegian Embassy in Islamabad, a special attaché is working to prevent cases of forced and under-age marriages involving nationals from the two countries, in cooperation with the Pakistani diaspora in Norway and local authorities in Pakistan.
Historical connections
Apart from the migration of Pakistanis to Norway in recent times, there are also earlier historical connections between the two countries. Two examples may be mentioned.
Georg Valentin von Munthe af Morgenstierne (1892-1978) was a Norwegian professor of linguistics at the University of Oslo. He specialized in Indo-Iranian languages. In 1924, Morgenstierne visited Peshawar and Kabul, where he stayed for half a year, working on what became an etymological dictionary of Pashto. He arrived in Kabul with a personal letter of introduction to the King of Afghanistan from the King of Norway. Morgenstierne also did research on the Indo-Iranian frontier languages of northeastern Afghanistan and northwestern Pakistan. In 1929, he returned to Baluchistan, Peshawar and Chitral, where he also studied the religion of the Kalash people in the Rumbur Valley. Together with linguistic studies, Morgenstierne collected remarkable scientific materials from the culture of the regional people, like images, movies from pre-Islamic ceremonial dances and sound recordings of nearly extinct languages. The materials are available in his database at the National Library of Norway.
Fredrik Barth (1928-2016) was a Norwegian professor and pioneer of social anthropology, who, among many other things, contributed significantly to the international understanding of Pathan culture. He came to the Swat Valley in 1954 and kept returning until the 1980s. The subject of his PhD dissertation from 1959 was the political organisation of the Swat Pathans. In 1985, he published the book “The Last Wali of Swat”, together with Mihangul Jahanzeb.
In 1950, the famous Norwegian philosopher and mountaineer Arne Næss scaled the highest (eastern) peak (25,263 ft/7,708m) of the mountain Tirich Mir in the princely state of Chitral. In 1964, another team of Norwegian climbers led by Ralph Høibakk scaled Tirich Mir's second highest (western) peak (25,237 ft/7,692m).