A meeting of the presidents of Russia and Finland will be held in Helsinki on August 21.

At a press conference on Tuesday, Finnish leader Sauli Niinistö said that during the upcoming talks with Vladimir Putin, it is planned to discuss mainly the geopolitical situation and Ukrainian issues.

“It is important to try to understand at this meeting what Russia thinks about trends in the world and geopolitics. The main goal is to discuss precisely the geopolitical situation, the situation in Ukraine. This is especially interesting, because after a while I will meet with the President of Ukraine Vladimir Zelensky, ”said the President of Finland.

At the same time, he emphasized that there are no acute issues in relations between the two countries.

Recall that earlier in the Kremlin press service it was reported that among the topics of the upcoming dialogue between Putin and Niinisto, relations between Russia and the European Union appear in the light of Finland’s presidency of the EU Council. It was also noted that both leaders also intend to discuss issues of cooperation between the two countries, the international and regional agendas.

For Vladimir Putin, this visit to Finland as head of state will be the ninth in a row. In the entire history of Russian-Finnish relations, this state was also visited by Presidents Boris Yeltsin (in July 1992 and March 1997) and Dmitry Medvedev (in April 2009 and July 2010). Thus, since 1991, Russian leaders traveled to Finland a total of 12 times.

“Real investment”

Strong economic, political and cultural ties connect Russia and Finland, experts say. Prior to the imposition of mutual sanctions between Moscow and the EU, Russia was Finland’s key trading partner: in 2013, trade between the countries amounted to $ 18 billion.

Against the background of the sanctioned confrontation and the cooling of relations between Russia and the West, trade between states slowed down, in 2014 this figure amounted to $ 16.1 billion, and by the end of 2015 - only $ 9.7 billion. However, since 2019, the states have managed to reverse the downward trend in trade: last year, its volumes reached $ 14.7 billion, an increase of 19.6% compared to 2017.

  • Trucks on the Russian-Finnish border
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  • © MIKKO STIG / Lehtikuva

As Mikko Hautala, the Finnish Ambassador to the Russian Federation, noted earlier, in terms of per capita population, Helsinki is the largest investor in the Russian economy. Today, investments in Russia from this state amount to about $ 14 billion.

“Of course, there are countries where the statistics show very large numbers, but here we need to raise the question of how real these investments are. And we are talking about production, real investment. We work very seriously in the Russian market, invest, and not just trade, ”the diplomat said.

Experts agree with these estimates. As Konstantin Voronov, Head of Regional Political Studies and Conflict Department of the European Political Studies Department of the IMEMO RAS, explained in a RT commentary, the countries have developed fairly interdependent economic ties.

“There is a certain asymmetry in the specific filling of the goods turnover: we supply them with raw materials, energy products, and the Finns - industrial goods. The only thing that could concern the Finnish side today is the possibility of increasing export duties on Russian timber supplies. However, possible toughening is unlikely to affect trade with Finland, ”said the expert.

Another promising area of ​​Finnish-Russian relations is tourism. Earlier, residents of the Russian North-West actively used the simplified visa regime for frequent trips to this country. According to the Finnish Statistical Office, in March of this year, Russians remained leaders in the number of days spent in Finnish hotels: in January alone, Russian citizens spent the night in Finland's hotels 146 thousand times. The British were in second place, they stayed in hotels in this country 64.5 thousand times over the same period.

It should be noted that several years ago there was even a discussion about the possible abolition of the visa regime - such an initiative was launched in 2016 by the authorities of the Finnish city of Kotka, as well as local railway workers.

However, in practice, the Finnish authorities preferred to abolish the simplified procedure for obtaining visas for Russians that has been in force for many years. New rules come into force from September of this year. It is clarified that now to obtain a visa, Russian citizens will have to provide consular workers with all the supporting documents for the trip, as in other countries of the Schengen area.

Moreover, as the deputy director of IMEMO RAS Alexei Kuznetsov noted, the decision of the Finnish side on visas cannot be called unexpected.

“Helsinki was under constant pressure, because the EU always believes that the Finns allow too much relief in relation to the Russian Federation. Finland has always suffered from this, because formally they are required to comply with common European approaches, but in reality, relations between Helsinki and Moscow are built differently than, for example, relations between Russia and Poland or the Baltic states, ”Kuznetsov explained in an interview with RT.

“Afraid of random incidents”

In addition to key issues on the bilateral agenda, leaders can discuss during the meeting the issue of ensuring security during military aviation flights over the Baltic. This was reported to reporters on the eve of the visit by the assistant to the Russian president, Yuri Ushakov.

“Surely, security in the Baltic Sea region will be affected, including the well-known initiative of the Finnish president to increase aviation safety over the Baltic, in particular, the use of transponders in military aviation,” said Ushakov.

  • NATO F-18 fighter over the Baltic Sea
  • RIA News
  • © Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation

Recall, against the backdrop of the degradation of relations between Russia and NATO, which began after the events of 2014 in Ukraine, incidents between the Russian aerospace forces and the military aviation of the member countries of the alliance, which increased their intelligence activity at Russian borders, became more frequent. Last year alone, about three thousand foreign military aircraft were discovered and accompanied by the forces of the radio-technical forces of the Russian Aerospace Forces near the borders of the Russian Federation. Such statistics in December 2018 were presented by the chief of the troops, Major General Andrei Koban in an interview with the publication "Red Star". A significant proportion of these cases occurred precisely in the Baltic region, experts say.

Recall that Finland is one of the few EU countries that are not members of NATO, although the leadership of the alliance has repeatedly invited the Finnish leadership to join the military bloc.

At the same time, Helsinki is worried about both the general hostility in relations between the West and Russia, and the growth of tension in the immediate vicinity of the Finnish borders, experts say.

In 2017, the ministries of defense of Russia and Finland even organized a direct line of communication to build confidence and “increase the transparency of military activity” in the Baltic Sea region.

“Finland is a neutral country. They are worried, like everyone else, the growth of tension in the Baltic. They are not afraid of deliberate provocations, but of random incidents when someone shoots somewhere, accidentally collides. And the Baltic is a very intensive region in terms of traffic flow: airplanes, ships. All this causes concern, ”explained Alexey Kuznetsov.

Arctic partnership

The Arctic may become another important topic during the talks between Vladimir Putin and Sauli Niinistö. This was previously reported by Yuri Ushakov. As the presidential aide recalled, in 2017-2019, Finland presides over the Arctic Council. This organization includes eight Arctic countries: Denmark, Iceland, Canada, Norway, USA, Finland, Sweden and Russia.

Arctic cooperation between Moscow and Helsinki has more than one decade. Back in the 1980s, it was at Finnish shipyards that hulls for icebreakers with the Taimyr and Vaigach nuclear installations were built. In 2010, the Finnish company Aker Arctic provided its technologies for the construction of the Arctic tankers Mikhail Ulyanov and Kirill Lavrov. In the future, Helsinki expects to increase its technological participation in the development of the Arctic, and cooperation with Russia, which has vast Arctic territories, is of great interest to the state, experts say.

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  • © Olaf Krüger / http: //imagebroker.com/

According to Konstantin Voronov, in the sphere of the Arctic partnership, Moscow and Helsinki have the potential to expand contacts and new orders from Russia for the supply of icebreakers and equipment for them.

“But most likely there will be no supercontracts, because our own industry and our shipbuilding sector are not loaded right now,” the expert explained.

It should be noted that Russian activity in the Arctic does not suit many Western countries - primarily the United States and Great Britain show dissatisfaction. However, in Helsinki, they are restrained about talking about the “Russian threat” in the Arctic, as they are not going to share the “Arctic pie,” Konstantin Voronov believes.

It is worth noting that on Tuesday, Sauli Niinistö, speaking in Helsinki at the congress of the heads of Finnish diplomatic missions, spoke out for holding the Arctic Summit, an intergovernmental forum with the participation of countries belonging to the Arctic Council.

“Although so far it has not been possible to convene the summit due to the tensions of large countries, the need to hold it has not disappeared,” said the Finnish president.

In addition, experts note that Niinistö and Putin can address the topic of energy cooperation. First of all, we are talking about Nord Stream-2. Recall that Helsinki joined this project, and at the end of last year, the laying of a pipeline in the exclusive economic zone of Finland began.

Summing up, experts predict that one of the main topics of the negotiations will be the general context of relations between Russia and the EU, the countries of the West.

“As regards the Ukrainian topic, it will be discussed especially deeply, since Finland and some other countries believe that Russia could do more on this issue, although our position is somewhat different. The second question is “Nord Stream 2”. The Finns, in general, advocate its construction. We have very good relations with Finland, but it’s obvious that the leaders will not only affect the purely Russian-Finnish agenda, ”summed up Alexey Kuznetsov.