Foreign Ministry's press releases

Minister for International Development Heidi Hautala, has invited her Nordic colleagues to meet in Helsinki on Monday, 23 January. A common Nordic policy on major development policy and development cooperation issues will be forged at the meeting.

The current way of handling Finland’s external economic relations and the internationalisation of businesses is siloed and fragmented. According to the working group investigating the development of Finland’s external economic relations, this is a major constraint on Finland’s ability to benefit from the opportunities brought about by changes in the world economy.

Decisions taken in various policy sectors in Finland have wide ranging implications for developing countries. At the Government’s evening session today, Minister for International Development Heidi Hautala outlined ways in which Finland could improve development coordination and consistency among different policy sectors.

Minister for European Affairs and Foreign Trade Alexander Stubb will go on an export promotion trip to Indonesia on 23–25 January.

Latvian Foreign Minister Edgars Rinkēvičs is due to visit Finland on January 18–19. Rinkēvičs is scheduled to meet both Foreign Minister Erkki Tuomioja and Minister for European Affairs and Foreign Trade Alexander Stubb.

Foreign Minister Erkki Tuomioja is set to visit Stockholm on January 16 at the invitation of Swedish Foreign Minister Carl Bildt.

The Government decided on 12 January to present to the President of the Republic the appointment of Counsellor for Foreign Affairs Päivi Kairamo-Hella to serve as Head of the Permanent Mission of Finland in Geneva from 1 July 2012.

Focus on the Economy and Technology, the annual publication showcasing Finland and targeted at key international markets, has just been published for the tenth time. This year’s issue highlights Finland’s strengths in design, start-up entrepreneurship and natural resource economy sectors.

Finland’s missions abroad processed a total of 1,258,999 visa applications in 2011, which is an all-time record high. The figure was up by 23 per cent on the year before. In the past five years the number of visa applications submitted to Finnish missions has more than doubled: in 2006 the number of applications processed totalled 585,181.

Foreign Minister Erkki Tuomioja is set to visit Nigeria and South Africa on January 5-10. The purpose of the visit is to foster links and cooperation with these two countries that have considerable political and economic strength, to lobby for support for Finnish aspirations to become a non-permanent member of the UN Security Council in 2013-2014, and to participate in the African National Congress centenary celebrations.