Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) yesterday told Finnish Prime Minister Petteri Orpo that Beijing was ready to work with Helsinki to uphold a UN-centered international system and advance a multipolar world based on economic globalization, Xinhua news agency reported.
Xi also said Beijing hoped Finland would play a constructive role in promoting the healthy and stable development of China-EU relations, Xinhua reported.
Orpo’s visit to China comes as US President Donald Trump’s volatile foreign policy decisions and confrontational approach toward allies push European countries to diversify their foreign relations.
Photo: Reuters
ARCTIC SECURITY
It also comes amid heightened attention on arctic security at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, last week, after Trump’s threat to seize Greenland, and prevent China and Russia from expanding their influence in the region.
Those threats appeared to have eased after Trump said the US had secured permanent access to the Danish territory, but arctic security remains a growing strategic concern for Finland, its NATO partners and China.
The arctic is becoming increasingly important to international trade as shrinking ice packs open up new and faster shipping routes, cutting transit times between Asia and Europe nearly in half.
Speaking on the sidelines of Davos last week, Finnish President Alexander Stubb said he wanted NATO to agree to an arctic security deal at its July summit, similar to the big increase in defense spending that it committed to last year.
One-third of Finland’s territory lies above the Arctic Circle, while China calls itself a “near-arctic state” and has ambitions to build a “Polar Silk Road.”
COLLABORATIONS
Xi yesterday called for the two sides to collaborate more in areas including energy transition, agriculture and forestry, and welcomed Finnish enterprises to “swim freely” in the “vast ocean” of China’s market.
Orpo, who is visiting from Sunday to today, told Xi that he looked forward to continued discussions on bilateral cooperation and international issues.
Orpo referenced the “candid and constructive talks” Xi had with Stubb during a 2024 state visit to Beijing.
At the time, Stubb raised an ongoing string of incidents involving damage to undersea power cables, gas pipelines and telecoms in which Chinese-registered ships have been implicated. A Chinese ship captain is facing allegations of criminal damage in a Hong Kong court in one of the cases.
Stubb in 2024 also raised the issue of North Korean support for Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, which he said NATO and the EU considered a provocation.
As Stubb had in the earlier meeting, Orpo invited Xi to visit Finland at a mutually convenient time, and said Finnish parliamentary speaker Jussi Halla-aho had invited Chinese National People’s Congress Standing Committee Chairman Zhao Leji (趙樂際).
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