Speech by President of the Republic Tarja Halonen at a banquet in honour of President Janez Drnovsek of Slovenia on 25.2.2004

It gives me great pleasure and honour to welcome you, Mr. President and your party, to our wintry Finland. Your visit is historic in several respects. It is the first state visit to our country by a president of Slovenia and takes place only two months before you become a member of the European Union. We know here in Finland that in Slovenia we shall be getting a good and active EU family member, with which we have already had a lot of cooperation to produce the new constitutional treaty for the Union.

We know that you are already familiar with Finland and the Finns. You have visited us as prime minister and cooperated with Finns in international contexts for the more than a decade that you have been leading Slovenia first to independence and then in its integration into the family of European peoples.

Frequent exchanges of visits became an established feature of relations between Finland and Slovenia already before you began your negotiations to join the European Union. I personally have warm memories of my visit to Ljubljana in 1998. I said then that I hoped Finland would open an embassy in Slovenia. Practical problems delayed the fulfilment of that wish, but today we can share pleasure in the knowledge that Finlands first resident ambassador to your country has been appointed and will take up her post next Monday.

We Finns have been following Slovenia’s political and social development with admiration since the breakup of Yugoslavia. Peacefully, but resolutely, the Slovenians have consolidated their independence and democratic institutions and embraced shared European values. In only a brief period you have also succeeded in putting your economy on a stable foundation.

On this basis it is natural that you have quickly integrated into European institutions, which have gladly accepted you as members. We Finns warmly welcome you to the European Union.

Finland and Slovenia share an aspiration to strengthen international peace and security. Slovenia has its own harsh memories of how these values can come under threat even in today’s Europe. Fortunately, joint efforts to which also Finland and the Finns have contributed have steered the situation in the Western Balkans onto a course of peaceful cooperation and development. Slovenia’s example will certainly help encourage others to continue reforms.

The lesson the experiences of the Western Balkans teaches is that we must become aware of conflicts more sensitively than in the past and find their causes. We should intervene in the causes of conflicts in good time and boldly. We should make joint efforts to manage even difficult situations and prevent them from developing into enormous human tragedies. And after conflicts have been resolved, we should be patient and work on a long-term basis to encourage the start of a new life.

International cooperation can help individual states a lot when they encounter difficulties. It lies in the interests of especially small nations to strengthen multilateral cooperation and above all the status and effectiveness of the United Nations. The European Union can be a very influential actor in this.

Mr. President, you expressed the wish that your delegation would have an opportunity during your visit for a discussion with Finnish experts on our country’s success factors in international competition. We shall be delighted to share our experience with you. You will have that opportunity at the forum that has been arranged for tomorrow forenoon.

In this context, I want to draw attention to the multiple challenge that faces both our own country and the entire global community. History and culture, in common with the other prerequisites for development, vary from country to country. In the final analysis, every country itself has the primary right and responsibility to determine its own development. Likewise, we all build globalisation on our own individual premises, but in order to achieve a fairer globalisation we must have the same starting points, such as democracy, human rights and the rule of law.

Yesterday in London the International Labour Organisation ILO published the report of the global commission it had appointed to examine globalisation with fairness. President Benjamin Mkapa and myself have co-chaired the commission. The globalisation that we set as our goal in the report is one founded on common values, and which is more humane, promotes development, prosperity, growth, employment and equality in addition to reducing poverty. We emphasise the role of a democratic and effective state as well as fair rules for the world economy, which offer all countries equal opportunities. We see also that the UN system is the core of global governance and has a unique opportunity to act in the forefront of the reform process.

Bilateral economic cooperation between Finland and Slovenia has been developing favourably in recent years. However, it is still on a quite modest level considering the opportunities that the development of both countries offers. I hope your visit and the discussions that the business delegation accompanying you are to have in Helsinki during these days will open new vistas.

Cultural cooperation has been developing briskly, especially in the field of literature, music and fine arts. Many of the landmark works in Finnish literature have been translated into Slovenian and hopefully we too will from now on be able to read more and more of your literature through the medium of Finnish.

Shared membership of the European Union will open completely new dimensions for the development of our bilateral cooperation. The opening up of the single market will give the economic sectors of our countries great opportunities, of which they must be able to avail themselves to the full. But the European Union is more than just economic cooperation; integration opened doors in many other ways as well, and this provides a unique opportunity to bring peoples living in different parts of Europe closer to each other.

In two months’ time the European Union will enlarge to create a community of over four hundred million people. We shall be together in it.

I want to convey the Finns’ congratulations and best wishes to the Slovenian people. I now propose a toast to your health as well as to a strengthening of cooperation between the Finnish and Slovenian peoples.