“As if directly from Finland’s key goals” – Petteri Orpo praises the program of the next commission

The leaders of the European Union member states have gathered in Brussels for a summit.

The European Council is to decide on the four top appointments and the Union’s strategic agenda, which will guide the work of the next Commission.

The heads of state will also discuss the situation in Ukraine and the Middle East. The meeting will be attended by the President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelenskyi. Upon his arrival, he thanked the EU for supporting Ukraine.

The EU and Ukraine started official membership negotiations this week. The decision to open the negotiations was already made in December, but the practical work only started now.

“Opening membership negotiations with the EU is very important for all of us Ukrainians, believe me. Of course, we need to work on the next steps,” Zelenskyi said.

The parties EPP, S&D and Renew of the “grand coalition” of the European Parliament reached an agreement earlier this week on the most important appointments for the next term in the EU.

If there are no surprises at the meeting, the German Christian Democrat will continue to lead the EU Commission Ursula von der Leyena Portuguese socialist becomes president of the European Council Antonio Costa and an Estonian liberal will become the high representative of the EU’s foreign relations Kaja Kalla. Maltese Christian Democrat Roberta Metsola will continue as Speaker of the Parliament.

Earlier this week, the outgoing liberal prime minister of the Netherlands was elected as the Secretary General of NATO Mark Rutte.

“A complex entity”

Finland is represented at the summit by the prime minister Petteri Orpo (cook). When he arrived at the meeting, he stated that both the appointment package and the content matters have already made great progress.

“A lot of work has been done in the background, discussed among the principals. At the same time, you have to think about the parliament, because the package has to have the support of the parliament. This is a complex entity,” Orpo stated.

However, according to him, the solution is “near”.

Prime Minister of Italy Giorgia Meloni was annoyed at last week’s informal summit that he was left out of the talks. The socialists in the parliament have refused to cooperate with the group of European conservatives and reformists represented by Meloni, even though the group has grown to become the third largest in the parliament.

In Orpo’s opinion, it is clear that Italy, as a large member country, needs to make its handprint visible.

According to Orpo, Finland can be very satisfied with the EU’s strategic agenda. It has taken into account many things that are important to Finland.

“It’s like directly from Finland’s key goals. Security, competitiveness, green transition, digitization, know-how, border security. These things can be found there.”

The European Council meeting may be accelerated by the fact that early parliamentary elections will be held in France on Sunday. with the president of France Emmanuel Macronilla so it’s a hurry to get home from Brussels.