LONGYEARBYEN, Norway  — When Kazem Ariaiwand fled Iran to seek asylum in the West he never imagined he would end up here, at the frozen edge of civilization, hawking kebabs in a place where polar bears outnumber people.

But he’s become a familiar sight in this desolate Arctic settlement, luring the hungry with the inviting fumes that tumble from the grill of his stand, a retired U.S. military field kitchen truck he has named “The Red Polar Bear.”

“I came here without knowing anyone. I had nothing. I came on a plane with my backpack,” said the 48-year-old Iranian. “Now I have many friends, almost the whole town.”

How the native of hot and bustling Tehran went on to win the unofficial title of “world’s northernmost kebab seller” comes down to the vagaries of early 20th century geopolitics.

Under a 1920 treaty, Svalbard is an international zone under Norwegian sovereignty that requires no tourist or resident visas. So when Norway rejected Ariaiwand’s asylum application in 2003, he fled as far north as you can fly on a commercial flight — to this land of legal limbo.

When he arrived in Longyearbyen, the main settlement of about 2,000 people, he had no job or accommodations. Left behind on the mainland were his son, then 15, and ex-wife, who both won permission to stay in Norway, he said.

Realizing his stay could be a long one, he went into business last year as a kebab seller, opening “The Red Polar Bear” in his bright red truck parked on a public lot at the center of tiny Longyearbyen.

“I had to move on,” Ariaiwand said. “The only option was here on Svalbard, which was the only place where you didn’t need some kind of permission to live.”

During winter, he keeps late opening hours to cook for hungry night-owls. Just before midnight on a Saturday in March, people were milling around The Red Polar Bear waiting for Ariaiwand to open, exhaling frost in a temperature of minus 4 F.

Finally, Ariaiwand trundled up in his battered blue Mitsubishi van and lugged plastic boxes with his homemade kebab meat, hamburgers and trimmings into the stand.

Since the islands’ frozen tundra is inhospitable for agriculture, Ariaiwand, like everyone else in the outpost, faces the additional hurdle of having to import all his supplies from the mainland.

As Ariaiwand worked inside, two teenage boys pressed their noses to the truck’s frosted window, as if that would make the kebab meat fry faster.

“It’s the best on Svalbard,” said Martin Ulsnes, 15, awaiting his weekly treat.

And while it may seem unlikely, there is plenty of competition. Three upscale restaurants as well as numerous smaller cafes cater to tourists and visiting researchers.

A few offer local delicacies, such as seal or whale — meat from the minke whales Norway hunts is imported from the mainland.

But with citizens of 35-nations represented on the sparsely populated islands, Longyearbyen’s cuisine could perhaps be described as global, much like the kebab. And Ariaiwand had international travelers in mind when he decided to open the stand.

“The only way to be independent was something that had something to do with the tourists. We have six, nearly seven, months with tourists in town,” he said.

Ariaiwand, who also works full-time at a local grocery store, refused to discuss the reasons for his flight from Tehran a dozen years ago, saying only that it was related to his job at a government-run publishing house and that he feared for his life.

The Norwegian Directorate of Immigration said it could not discuss details of his case, citing privacy laws.

His journey took him to Sweden for 18 months and then Norway for almost five years, before he ended up on Svalbard in self-imposed exile on the 23,550-square-mile archipelago on the planet’s northern fringe.

Svalbard Police Inspector Trond Aagesen said Ariawand’s success on Svalbard was highly unusual — perhaps three other outsiders have managed to settle here. He had advised against even trying.

“It is a small place. There is a shortage of accommodations and jobs,” Aagesen said.

He recounted how one Bulgarian family had been duped into believing that Svalbard was a polar paradise. They sold everything in Bulgaria, including their home, only to face immediate financial ruin on Svalbard.

That said, all that is required to live here is a place to live and a job. And Ariaiwand found both his first week in Longyearbyen. It probably helped that the Iranian seems to smile all the time, and extolls the virtues of a positive attitude.

Still, he feared unemployment and despondency over being trapped in an Arctic outpost about 300 miles north of the mainland, especially during the polar night, cut off from his son and other family.

“If I didn’t stay busy I would become depressed,” he said. “It’s dark for much of six months and very difficult. I needed something to think about and came up with this idea.”

“And on such a small island, you feel, really, a little insecure (about jobs),” he said.

Ariaiwand found his military mobile kitchen in Germany on the Internet. His brother, Mohamad, who runs a car repair shop in Germany, picked it up, painted it red, and drove it to northern Norway for transport by ship to Svalbard.

The Red Polar Bear, or “Roede Isbjoern” is open weekends in winter, and most days in the summer tourist season. Ariaiwand made his polar bear red because “it has to be a little different so people come over.”

The kebab vendor longs to see his now 20-year-old son, who has visited the islands once, and to escape the spectacular but mind-numbingly unchanging polar landscape. But he fears deportation if he sets foot on the mainland without a visa.

At the small souvenir store nearby, shopkeeper Lise Klungseth Brattset, 39, was among locals who say Ariaiwand should be allowed to visit mainland Norway and not be “imprisoned on Svalbard.”

“He is very likable, very nice,” she said. “I think he has managed unbelievably well, considering his circumstances.”

His latest of many visa applications was rejected in February, leaving him stranded near the North Pole.

“I personally need to get out of this town at times. It is not a place where you can live for such a long time,” he said.