From the New York Times: Norwegian voters have returned their Labor-dominated government to office, narrowly endorsing Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg’s pursuit of expanded public services and rejecting angry demands by some of his opponents to crack down harshly on immigration.

According to official results with 99.9 percent of the votes counted early Tuesday, Mr. Stoltenberg’s three-party left-wing coalition won 86 seats in the 169-seat Parliament. That would give it just enough of a margin to continue as the only left-of-center government in Scandinavia and one of the few remaining in Western Europe . . .

Practically absent from the campaign were questions of foreign policy, such as the sitting government’s refusal to allow the 500 Norwegian soldiers serving under NATO command in Afghanistan to fight in the south of that country, where the Taliban insurgency is strongest. (photo: AFP)

All four opposition parties favored removing the restriction, which NATO’s leadership has complained about, but none of them made it a campaign issue in deference to popular sentiment. No one on either side of the political divide raised the issue of joining the European Union, which Norwegians rejected by referendum in 1994.