With its novel new offer, Vesterålen Online hopes to entice more readers, as the region has many immigrant speakers of Arabic, according to its editor Geir Bjørn Nilsen. Russian, the region’s second most popular language, is also being considered.
In a bid to broaden its readership, Vesterålen Online has extended its news coverage by adding a page in Arabic. After only a week, the newspaper reports a lot of traffic on these articles.
“How should they learn to read and write Norwegian, when they get it in Arabic?” a user questioned in NRK’s comment section on Facebook.
“And I thought learning Norwegian was still a must for staying in Norway and becoming a Norwegian citizen,” a person mused.
“Is it still 1 April?” yet another one asked incredulously.