Mihkelson will give a speech at the Paasikivi Society and meet with the Defence Minister of Finland
Today and tomorrow Chairman of the National Defence Committee of the Riigikogu (Parliament of Estonia) Marko Mihkelson is on a visit to Helsinki, where he will deliver a report titled “The Security Challenges of the Baltic Sea Region” to foreign policy opinion leaders and diplomats at the Paasikivi Society and meet with the Minister of Defence of Finland Jussi Niinistö.
In his report, Mihkelson will focus on the security challenges of the Nordic and Baltic region, analysing them from the point of view of global actors, Russia’s revisionism and regional defence cooperation. In his opinion we are closer than we have ever been to creating a common security space in the Nordic and Baltic region.
Mihkelson thinks that the objective weakening of the positions of the West, continuing economic emergence of Asia, Russia’s revisionism and religious wars in the Islamic world will present a rather turbulent prospect for our nearest future.
“The to a great extent static world order of the Cold War period is being replaced by something humankind has never experienced before,” Mihkelson said before the visit. “And it does not concern only the relations between the states and the dynamics between them, but also involves cross-border or global actors that are sometimes hard to perceive.”
Mihkelson emphasises that, in order to ensure peace and security in our region, it is necessary to increase the rate of deterrence, first of all through NATO defence cooperation. “We have challenges ahead where no free and democratic country of the Baltic region will have an alternative to close mutual cooperation and the primacy of international law in combating security threats,” Mihkelson says.
In his report, Mihkelson will also discuss information security and cyber security. The cross-border security threat connected with them has especially during the last decade become one of the top priorities for the governments of our region. He will also speak about the migration crisis that has hit Europe, the international terrorism connected with the Islamic extremism, and the security and economic issues relating to the Baltic Sea.
The Paasikivi Society, founded in 1958, unites Finnish foreign policy opinion leaders, experts and others interested in foreign policy. From Estonia, Riho Terras, Jaak Aaviksoo and Lennart Meri have also spoken at the meetings of the Society.
Mihkelson is on a two-day visit to Helsinki. Tomorrow he will meet with the Minister of Defence of Finland Jussi Niinistö.
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Epp-Mare Kukemelk
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