SPEECH
BY PRESIDENT MARTTI AHTISAARI AT A DINNER IN HONOUR
OF PRESIDENT CARLO AZEGLIO CIAMPI OF ITALY IN
HELSINKI ON 28.9.1999
My wife and I are
delighted to have you here as our guests this
evening. We greatly appreciate the fact that one of
your first visits since assuming office has brought
you to Finland. We believe it demonstrates the spirit
of cooperation that prevails between our countries
and peoples. This cooperation rests on old traditions
and gained further strength when we joined the
European Union in 1995.
Finland is now half
way through her first stint in the Presidency of the
European Union. We have taken this demanding task
seriously and done a lot of work. I am pleased to
note that Finland’s and Italy’s views and
goals with respect to issues of European integration
are close. I know that we can count on Italy’s
support during our Presidency.
For us Finns,
Italy’s status as a cradle of European
civilisation and a storehouse of the traditions of
Antiquity is a well-known and admired fact. Villa
Lante, the beautiful Renaissance villa that Finland
maintains in a central location in Rome, demonstrates
the importance that we have always attached to our
ties with Italy and Classical culture. Villa Lante
houses Institutum Romanum Finlandiae, where a
great number of Finnish scholars and artists have
worked in the course of nearly five decades.
The strong popularity
of the European Union in your country shows that
Italians believe the peoples of this continent can
solve the difficult problems facing them only by
working together. For a small nation like Finland,
wholehearted participation in European cooperation is
especially important. We want to play a part in
building a Europe that is as united, democratic and
open to the surrounding world as possible. Another
bond that links us within the European Union is the
Euro. We recognise the important contribution that
you, Mr. President, made in your earlier office to
facilitating the birth of the single currency.
For Italy’s
neighbour the Western Balkans, recent years have been
a difficult period. The human suffering that war and
violence cause, and which we thought had been
relegated to history in our continent, have returned
quite close to our borders. Last June, thanks to
resolute action on the part of the international
community, a political solution to the most recent
crisis in Kosovo was achieved. Now we face the
difficult challenges of restoring trust and
rebuilding society and the economy there. Italy is of
great importance in the region. We have noted with
appreciation your country’s considerable
contributions in peacekeeping, the provision of
humanitarian aid and helping the countries of the
region along the road to a democratic and
well-functioning society.
Italy is an important
cooperation partner for Finland in numerous sectors.
Your country’s status as one of the world’s
leading industrial powers makes it an important
market for Finnish companies. Trade between our
countries has been developing favourably in recent
years. This is a positive trend that deserves
continuing encouragement. I know that Finnish
companies are very interested in developing
cooperation with Italian small and medium enterprises
representing a high level of technology.
Finnish-Italian
cooperation in the field of culture has been lively
for a very long time. Both the cultural agreement
between our countries and the work of individuals and
organisations have borne fruit. Traditional sectors
of cooperation such as architecture, design, the
visual arts and music have been joined by new ones
like cinema and dance. Finnish literature has
likewise found an audience in Italy in recent years.
I am especially pleased that interest in exchanges of
schoolchildren and students is growing on both sides.
It is important for young people to learn to embrace
and understand different cultures, and there is no
better way of doing it than living and studying in a
foreign country.
For writers Italy has
always been a focus of longing, one that also Finnish
authors have taken as their theme. This is what our
distinguished poetess Elina Vaara, who has translated
Petrarch, Dante and Tasso into Finnish, says in her
poem "For a Travelling Companion": *
Only free of
shackles, off the highways,
do dreams build their bridges.
To carry us all to the Italy
for which we yearn.*
This poem aptly
reflects the warm memories that my wife and I still
have of our visit to Italy in January 1997.
I hope your visit to
Helsinki will leave you with a pleasant picture of
our country. Now let me propose a toast to your
health, the success of our peoples and cooperation
between Italy and Finland in the Europe of the third
millennium.
* free translation
