News

On 24 March, Vice-Minister of Foreign Affairs Taurimas Valys met in Helsinki with Ville Tavio, Minister for Foreign Trade and Development Cooperation at the Finnish Ministry for Foreign Affairs, and Sakari Puisto, Minister of Economic Affairs.

During the meeting with Tavio, the Vice-Minister discussed bilateral relations between Lithuania and Finland, economic partnership, and development cooperation projects in Ukraine.

“Lithuania places great emphasis on involving the private sector in development cooperation activities and is consistently strengthening this direction. We also seek opportunities to create joint consortia of Lithuanian and Finnish companies in implementing ‘Global Gateway’ investment projects,” said Valys.

The Vice-Minister emphasized the importance of Finland’s strong and consistent support for Ukraine, including its leadership in the “Shelter Coalition” for Ukraine, and invited Finland to contribute to a program initiated by Lithuania—the construction of new schools throughout Ukraine.

Vice-Minister Valys discussed bilateral economic cooperation and economic security issues with Finnish Minister of Economic Affairs Puisto.

“Finland is a close neighbor of Lithuania, an EU partner, and a NATO ally. We are interested in further developing bilateral and regional cooperation and strengthening economic ties, particularly in high-value-added and innovative sectors such as the defense industry, financial technology, life sciences, lasers, and photonics,” emphasized the Vice-Minister.

Valys highlighted that the public-private sector cooperation developed in Finland over many decades to strengthen comprehensive security, resilience, and economic security serves as an excellent and exemplary model of a resilient state.

Valys presented Lithuania’s economic strengths, investment environment, and state incentives to representatives of Business Finland, and also invited Finnish companies to become more actively involved in joint projects, particularly in the field of defense technologies.