Skip to content
Media
Valtioneuvoston kanslia frontpage

Prime Minister Sipilä and President Macron discussed future of EU

Government Communications Department
Publication date 22.9.2017 21.03 | Published in English on 25.9.2017 at 11.35
Press release 424/2017

Prime Minister Juha Sipilä and President of France Emmanuel Macron met in Paris on Friday 22 September. They discussed topical EU affairs, such as defence cooperation, the Economic and Monetary Union, and migration. Furthermore, Prime Minister Sipilä presented, upon the request of President Macron, the reforms carried out in Finland to fix the public finances and to create new jobs and improve wellbeing.

“We had a very fruitful conversation on the concrete measures undertaken in both countries. The situation both in Finland and in France requires constant renewal to boost growth and to create more jobs. I appreciate President Marcon’s way of taking action. He has ahead of him a task that has importance for the entire EU, and based on my own experience, I can predict that the task will not be an easy one,” Prime Minister Sipilä said.

A little more than a year ago, Finland and France expressed their strong support for the development of the EU defence cooperation.

“Defence cooperation is now progressing rapidly and along with the guidelines that we then suggested. Today, we appealed together for a continued development of the defence cooperation in accordance with the policies outlined by the European Council in June, in terms of both the permanent structured cooperation and other projects. Finland and France are ready to be forerunners in this respect,” Sipilä said.

“We also had a good conversation concerning the Economic and Monetary Union. The development of the EMU is a topical question right now, and therefore this was an excellent time to have this conversation with President Macron. I thanked President for taking an active role in this discussion. We went through the different models in great detail and deliberated, realistically, what kind of effects the different alternatives would have for the establishment of stability in entire Europe. I am convinced that this provides us with a great foundation to continue to discuss the question constructively through the autumn until the December European Council, where the issue will be on the official agenda of the Heads of State,” Prime Minister Sipilä said.

Inquiries: Riikka Pakarinen, Special Adviser (EU Affairs), tel. +358 50 468 0833, Prime Minister’s Office