The director of The Åland Isands Peace Institute (ÅIPI), Associate Professor Sia Spiliopoulou Åkermark, has been granted a research stipend from the private Finnish foundation The project is a cooperation between the ÅIPI and The University of Lapland in Rovaniemi. Four researchers participate in the project: Sia Spiliopoulou Åkermark (docent and leader of the project), Pirjo Kleemola-Juntunen (jur. dr., post-doc), Timo Koivurova (research professor, director at the Northern Institute for Environmental and Minority Law and acting director of the Arctic Center), researcher Saila Heinikoski (PhD candidate, international relations), as well as research assistant Filip Holiencin (international law).
The research will study the demilitarization from the vantage point of international law. The main questions are how the demilitarisation and neutralisation regime of the Åland Islands is affected by the development of modern technology and by the proliferating and varying modes of military-civilian cooperation in the Baltic Sea. The project will also make comparisons between the Åland Islands and other demilitarised regions, for example Svalbard.
– There is a great need for updated research on demilitarisation. I am very pleased that we have been granted support from a Finnish foundation, in high competition with other projects, and in cooperation with one of Finland’s most prominent institutions, the Northern Institute for Environmental and Minority Law in Rovaniemi. KONE supports “bold projects”, and their decision is yet another confirmation that our research is of high quality and internationally relevant, says ÅIPI director Sia Spiliopoulou Åkermark.
