India and Nordic countries have a new engagement, driven in part by a desire for middle powers to find common ground in the face of concerns about global powers. However, they have clear differences over ties with Russia, as said by Iceland’s Prime Minister Kristrún Mjöll Frostadóttir. Speaking to The Hindu on the sidelines of the India-Nordic Summit in Oslo on Tuesday (May 19, 2026), Ms. Frostadóttir, who at 38 is one of the world’s youngest leaders and an economist by training, said she hopes to discuss new areas to improve bilateral trade, which is at present at extremely low levels, through a focus on renewable energy technologies, and pitched for more Indian films to be shot with Icelandic backdrops.

(The reporter was in Oslo at the invitation of the Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs to cover the India-Nordic Summit)