Current affairs

A joint tender by Denmark, Finland and Lithuania has won a contract for a Twinning project in Belarus. The two-year project will strengthen the preconditions for producing high-quality data for decision-makers in Belarus. Finland's representative in the project is Statistics Finland.

Owing to the coronavirus outbreak, Finland, in line with the rest of the Schengen countries, has suspended the reception of normal visa applications in Finland’s missions with immediate effect from 19 March until further notice.

On 16 March, the Nordic and Baltic countries' Foreign Ministers and Norway's State Secretary decided to help their citizens in their return home.

The Ministry for Foreign Affairs and Finland’s Missions are monitoring the impacts of the coronavirus (COVID-19) epidemic in cooperation with the Finnish Institute for Health and Welfare (THL), and they are in constant contact with key actors with regard to the situational picture and any necessary measures.

The EU is revising its Visa Code in order to facilitate visa procedures for travellers and to respond more effectively to the challenges posed by illegal migration. Finland will start applying the new Visa Code on 2 February 2020 together with other Schengen countries.

One of the key objectives of Finland’s Presidency of the Council of the EU has been to turn the European Union into a global climate leader. The 90 diplomatic and consular missions of Finland abroad have now risen to the challenge. The missions have addressed climate change in diverse ways, ranging from ways to exercise political influence to environmentally friendly choices in everyday life.

All Finnish missions abroad and organisations issuing visas, including the Border Guard, Finnish Customs and the Police, started to use the new EU visa sticker on 11 November 2019

Minister for Foreign Affairs Pekka Haavisto will visit Berlin on Thursday 17 October 2019 to attend the 20th anniversary of the Nordic Embassies complex. The event will be attended by the Foreign Ministers of the five Nordic countries and Germany’s Minister of Foreign Affairs Heiko Maas.

From 1 October 2019, Schengen visas will be issued by the following seven embassies of Finland in Europe: Berlin, Dublin, London, Madrid, Nicosia, Sofia and Stockholm.