Foreign Ministry's press releases

On 18 February, Minister for Development Cooperation and Foreign Trade Ville Skinnari will visit Stockholm to attend a meeting convened by Sweden’s Minister for Foreign Trade and Nordic Affairs Anna Hallberg. The meeting will discuss ways to promote trade and sustainable development. In addition to Minister Skinnari, representatives of Denmark, Germany, the Netherlands and the Czech Republic are expected to attend the meeting.

The EU Foreign Affairs Council (FAC) will meet in Brussels on 17 February. Finland’s representative at the meeting will be Minister for Foreign Affairs Pekka Haavisto. The topics on the agenda will be the EU’s relationship with the African Union and the situation in Libya. In connection with the meeting, Foreign Ministers will also meet the Indian Minister of External Affairs to discuss the preparations for the upcoming EU–India Summit.

Minister for Foreign Affairs Pekka Haavisto will attend the Munich Security Conference in Germany on 14–15 February.

EU High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Josep Borrell Fontelles and EU Commissioner for International Partnerships Jutta Urpilainen have invited EU development ministers to discuss the new EU Strategy for Africa at an informal lunch in Brussels on 13 February. Minister for Development Cooperation and Foreign Trade Ville Skinnari will represent Finland at the meeting.

The Ministry for Foreign Affairs has granted EUR 420,000 in discretionary government transfers to 20 civil society organisations’ (CSOs) Europe information. The total number of supported projects is 22.

The preparatory meeting of the UN Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues (UNPFII) will be held in Inari on 10–16 February 2020. The meeting will be attended by 16 members of UNPFII from around the world.

The Polish Minister of Foreign Affairs Jacek Czaputowicz will visit Finland on 12–13 February 2020.

Finland has been elected as the Chair of the Freedom Online Coalition (FOC), a partnership committed to supporting internet freedoms and promoting respect for human rights, FOC members for the year 2021. The decision was announced on Friday 7 February at the Annual Freedom Online Conference in Accra.

On 10 February, Minister for Foreign Affairs Pekka Haavisto will visit Vienna to attend the third International Conference on Nuclear Security, organised by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA). While in Vienna, Minister Haavisto will meet, among others, Austria’s Federal Minister for European and International Affairs Alexander Schallenberg and Federal Minister for Climate Action, Environment, Energy, Mobility, Innovation and Technology Leonore Gewessler.

The Development Policy Committee (DPC) for this government term met at its first plenary session on 6 February 2020. Its key aim is to encourage discussion on development policy at national and, in particular, parliamentary levels. All parliamentary parties and key stakeholders in development policy contexts are represented in the Committee.