Today, the President of the Riigikogu Ene Ergma met the Marshal of the Polish Sejm Ewa Kopacz and the members of the Sejm accompanying her, and the Polish Ombudsman for Children Marek Michalak. The future of the European Union, cooperation of the two countries in international organisations and the Estonian-Polish parliamentary relations were discussed.

Ergma said that Poland is a close cooperation partner and friend to Estonia. “We have consensus and very close cooperation in international organisations. We wish to continue to tighten the relations at all levels.”

The President of the Riigikogu pointed out Poland’s successful presidency in the European Union in the second half of 2011 and she expressed a desire to learn from these experiences, above all in the issues regarding the tasks assigned to the parliament in connection with presidency. Both heads of parliaments highlighted the good cooperation at the level of the Foreign Affairs Committees and the EU Affairs Committees of the parliaments, as well as regular meetings between the three Baltic countries and Poland. Ergma noted that the Riigikogu is interested in establishing closer working relationships also between other standing committees and it equally supports in every way more active communication between parliamentary groups.

When speaking of the Rail Baltica project to be financed from the Connecting Europe Facility, Ergma stressed the necessity of this modern and fast rail link. “Estonia is interested in train connection to Warsaw and, from there, further to Europe, and it is also in the interests of Poland to have, besides flight connection, a possibility to travel quickly by train to Tallinn or Helsinki. I hope that our parliaments will be able to contribute to the acceleration of this process,” Ergma said.

The Deputy Chairman of the European Union Affairs Committee of the Riigikogu Marianne Mikko and Deputy Chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee Enn Eesmaa also took part in the meeting.

Today, Ergma and Kopacz will open the exhibition “Janusz Korczak – Reformer of the World” on the first floor of the Riigikogu, and after that they will award the winners of the children’s drawing competition dedicated to Korczak in the White Hall.

Today, the Marshal of the Polish Parliament also met the Prime Minister Andrus Ansip. Meetings with the President of the Republic Toomas Hendrik Ilves and the Vice-President of the Riigikogu Jüri Ratas are scheduled for tomorrow.

Photos of today’s meeting: https://fotoalbum.riigikogu.ee/v/2013/Ene+Ergma/Ewa_Kopacz/

The Riigikogu Press Service

16 January 2013