Foreign Ministry's press releases

Minister for Foreign Trade and Development Paavo Väyrynen told journalists at a press conference held at the Ministry for Foreign Affairs on 26 June that the use of State funds to repay industry for wood tariffs is being investigated. According to Väyrynen, the Ministry is also investigating whether the refund of export tariffs could be financed by adopting a vehicle-specific transit fee for transports to Russia by way of Finland.

Elvira Nabiullina, Minister for Economic Development and Trade of Russia, called me in the evening yesterday and announced that our proposal for a tariff scheme for birch based on end use cannot be realised. As grounds she stated that the scheme should also be applied in exportation to China, for which monitoring cannot be organised in practice. Minister Nabiullina said that a solution needs to be sought through WTO negotiations.

The Nordic Ministers for Foreign Affairs – Foreign Minister Alexander Stubb of Finland, Foreign Minister Carl Bildt of Sweden, Foreign Minister Jonas Gahr Støre of Norway, Foreign Minister Per Stig Møller of Denmark and Foreign Minister Ingibjörg Sólrún Gísladóttir of Iceland – have today issued a joint statement on the situation in Zimbabwe.

The OSCE Chairman-in-Office, Finnish Foreign Minister Alexander Stubb, will visit Kyrgyzstan and Kazakhstan from 30 June to 2 July.

The State Secretaries for foreign affairs of the European Union Member States will visit Helsinki on Friday, 27 June, at the invitation of Secretary of State Pertti Torstila.

The summit for the EU and Mediterranean countries will take place in Paris on Sunday 13 July. The meeting will be organised by France which begins its EU Presidency in July. The EU Member States, 12 countries participating in the Barcelona Process, and Libya, Croatia, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Montenegro and Monaco have been invited to the summit. President of the Republic Tarja Halonen and Prime Minister Matti Vanhanen will represent Finland at the meeting.

Foreign Minister Alexander Stubb summoned Ambassador Reza Nazarahari, the Iranian ambassador to Finland, today, 24 June, owing to the execution of a minor that took place in Iran.

Foreign Minister Alexander Stubb will meet NATO Secretary General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer at the NATO Headquarters in Brussels on Friday 27 June. Their topics of discussion will include, for instance, the development and future prospects of NATO, NATO cooperation with the EU, and the on-going crisis management operations.

On 16 June the Nordic foreign ministers met in Luxembourg and agreed that an independent study should be drawn up to look into how Nordic cooperation in the area of foreign and security policy can be developed over the next 10-15 years.

The Foreign Ministers of the European Union met in Luxembourg on Monday to prepare the European Council meeting of 19–20 June. The central topic of discussion was the situation pertaining to the Lisbon Treaty following the referendum in Ireland. “This is not a profound crisis. Difficulties have been overcome before”, Stubb said in Luxembourg.