Novaya Zemlya Novaya Zemlya Novaya Zemlya (, lit. "the new land"), also known as Nova Zembla (especially in Dutch), is an archipelago in the Arctic Ocean in northern Russia and the extreme northeast of Europe, the easternmost point of Europe lying at Cape Flissingsky on the Northern island. West of Novaya Zemlya is the Barents Sea, and to the east is the Kara Sea. Novaya Zemlya is composed of two main islands, the northern Severny Island and the southern Yuzhny Island, which are separated by the Matochkin Strait. Administratively, it is incorporated as Novaya Zemlya District, one of the twenty-one in Arkhangelsk
Arctic desert Arctic desert The Arctic desert ecoregion (WWF ID:PA1101) is a terrestrial ecoregion that covers the island groups of Svalbard, Franz Josef Land, Severny Island and Severnaya Zemlya in the Artic Ocean, above 75 degrees north latitude. The islands are covered with glaciers, snow, and bare rock in a harshly cold environment. The temperature does rise above freezing for short periods in the summer, so some ice melt occurs, and the area supports colonies of sea birds and mammals. It has an area of . The ecoregion stretches 2,000 km west-to-east, and 1,000 km north-to-south, across the Arctic Ocean north of