Denmark to Remain in IWC. After threatening earlier this year to leave the International Whaling Commission (IWC) over a dispute about Greenlandic whale quotas, the government of Denmark has announced that it will remain in the organization. "A number of positive responses have been received in support of aboriginal subsistence whaling in Greenland and the Kingdom of Denmark's continued membership of the IWC," Gitte Hundahl, Denmark's whaling commissioner, wrote in a letter to the commission dated December 18. Arctic Journal

Building Dens for Finland's Saimaa Seals. A project to construct man-made dens for the endangered Saimaa seal will continue after recently receiving EU funding for the next five years. The Saimaa ringed seal, a subspecies of ringed seal, is among the most endangered seals in the world, having a current total population of only about 310 individuals in the Saimaa area of Finland. The population is descended from ringed seals that were separated from the rest of their species after the last ice age. This seal, along with the Ladoga Seal and the Baikal Seal, is one of the few living freshwater seals in the world and Finland is working hard to preserve its tiny population. Alaska Dispatch

Statistics Show Lower Life Expectancies, Higher Homicides Rates in Canada's North. The Inuit live 10 years less than other Canadians. Such is the sad observation established by Statistics Canada. This federal government agency has released results from a study evaluating life expectancies and causes of death over 19 years in the four Canadian regions with mostly Inuit populations. The study reveals that the life expectancy of residents of Inuit regions increased during this period but still remains lower than that of other Canadians. Alaska Dispatch

The Historical Fight for Arctic Sovereignty. For reasons that aren't particularly discernible, Arctic issues rarely receive much attention in Alaska's statewide elections. This seems odd given that so much of the state's economy and government funding derives from oil mining on the North Slope. Compounding this absence in our political debates is the impact of climate change, which is becoming both costly in terms of what is occurring to Arctic communities and ecosystems, and potentially a boon as offshore fossil fuel deposits become recoverable owing to newly opened seas.  What might surprise many Alaskans, meanwhile, is that our sea boundaries with both Canada and Russia have yet to be finalized. At a time of massive change in the Arctic, with the world's governmental, corporate, environmental, and indigenous rights interests all converging on the region, the full extent of Alaska's Arctic sovereignty - and therefore America's - remains unclear. Fairbanks Daily News-Miner

[Alaska] Game Board to Consider Hunting and Trapping Charges. The Alaska Board of Game is meeting in Kotzebue Jan. 10-13, 2014 to consider nearly 40 proposals concerning changes to hunting and trapping regulations in the state's Arctic and Western regions, which include game management units 18, 22, 23 and 26A. Many proposals have already been submitted by the Alaska Department of Fish and Game and the general public, most of which concern the hunting and trapping season dates and bag limits. Alaska Dispatch

5,000 Polar Bears Expected to be Born Around New Year's. The World Wildlife Fund for Nature says about 5,000 polar bears are expected to be born in the Arctic around New Year's. New Year's is the time of year when polar bears give birth in the Arctic, RIA Novosti reported. UPI