It marks the chasm of wealth that splits Europe's Arctic between poor and chaotic Russia and the wealthy, orderly Nordic states.

Since the collapse of the Soviet Union, the West's Cold War fears of nuclear attack from the Kola have been replaced by anxiety about the spread of atomic radiation, industrial pollution, disease and social unrest.

The peninsula, about 800 km north of St Petersburg and on the Barents Sea, is home to strategically located military harbors as well as pristine forest and stark Tundra.

Offering the Russian Navy a sea corridor to the North Atlantic, it is the only place where Russia borders the European Union, at neutral Finland, or Nato, at Norway. Few frontiers have a greater contrast in living standards. Finns and Norwegians earn perhaps 30 times more than their Kola neighbours, in addition to having generous education, health and welfareservices. Good jobs dried up on the Kola along with the decrease in Russian military spending after the Cold War.

In an outdoor market, Fiina Torchinkova tries to make a living by selling shoes, after working as a photographer for 12 years. "I make enough to buy a piece of bread, and maybe some butter if I am lucky," she says.

As the base for the once-powerful Russian north fleet, the Kola still is home to 155 nuclear submarines, although 71 of them are derelict. And it has eight nuclear-powered icebreakers.

It is those deteriorating vessels that have the peninsula's western neighbors worried. In 1996, a report by the Norwegian environmental group Bellona said about two-thirds of the nuclear waste ever dumped in the world's oceans lies off the Kola.Norway, the world's second largest oil exporter, has spent about 21 million dollars on Kola environmental projects. The EU and the United States also are involved in similar projects. Nordic countries, notably Norway, are augmenting environmental projectswith programmes to shore up the Kola's collapsed health and social services.

"The challenge is to show the public, not in the least on the Kola, that some progress is being made," said Geir Hunneland, a Norwegian expert on the Kola.

For peninsula residents, immediate survival overshadows long-term dangers from radiation and pollution. Even those with jobs often don't get paid. And there is little of a social safety net for those without work.

Life on the Tundra can be extremely harsh. Some homes lack heat on 40 degree C winter nights. There are few jobs, money for food is short, and medicine often is unavailable.

Life expectancy has plunged to 47 years for men and 48.9 years for women. That's about 30 years less than their Nordic neighbours.

About 200 km to the east of Murmansk, a rough road ends at the village of Lovozero. There Europe's largest and most pristine wilderness stretches in unbroken grandeur south to the shores of the White Sea.

Murmansk, on a long bay near the middle of the Kola, isthe biggest city anywhere in the Arctic. Its 500,000 people are a reminder of the days when Soviet rulers sent thousands of soldiers, miners and others to the peninsula, pushing the population from a few thousand to more than a million.