President Halonen at the Mediterranean Union Summit: A Growing Interest in Sea Areas in the EU

President of the Republic of Finland Tarja Halonen arrived on Sunday, 13 July 2008 in Paris from Riga to participate in the Euro-Mediterranean Summit. This was the first and constituting summit of the Mediterranean Union. The goal of the Union is to strengthen the already strong co-operation between the EU and the Mediterranean countries. The programme for Monday, 14 July included festivities of the French National Day and a lunch hosted by the French presidential couple. Finland has been actively involved from the beginning in this co-operation, also known the EU’s Barcelona Process. "The strengthening of the stability and development in the Mediterranean area is in the interest of all the parties and best results are achieved through co-operation without excluding anyone", President Halonen noted.

President Nicolas Sarkozy of France welcomed President Tarja Halonen to the Euro-Mediterranean Summit in Paris. Bild: Lehtikuva / Reuters/Charles Platiau

"Strong co-operation in the Mediterranean also positively reflects to the other EU maritime co-operation, such as the Baltic Sea and most recently the Black Sea area.

Environmental protection and maritime safety are common challenges for the Baltic Sea and the Mediterranean. The year 2020 is, in fact, an important milestone for both. By then, the condition of both seas should have been considerably improved. The aim of the de-pollution of the Mediterranean was set at the Cairo miniterial meeting in 2006 and the ambitious action program to improve the condition of the Baltic Sea was approved at a meeting in Poland last November.

In the Baltic Sea, we have good experiences from, for example, an obligatory ship reporting system maintained by Estonia, Finland and Russia to improve maritime safety. We have achieved a lot at the Baltic Sea, but there is still much work to do.

I have warm memories when I and Javier Solana as the then Foreign Ministers agreed on organising the first Barcelona Process ministerial meeting on environment in Finland in 1997. Another important new initiative was the ministerial meeting on equality and the status of women that Finland organised during our EU Presidency in 2006.

I hope that, after this impressive start, the establishment of the Mediterranean Union will lead to concrete co-operation. This could, for example, mean environmental and information technology projects that Finnish NGOs and companies could participate in. There is surely a long way to go, and we might need to overcome both organisational and financial obstacles. Our own experience from the Baltic Sea area is, however, positive and highlight the need for co-operation."