SPEECH BY THE PRESIDENT, MARY ROBINSON, AT THE STATE DINNER IN HONOUR OF PRESIDENT AHTISAARI
SPEECH BY THE PRESIDENT, MARY ROBINSON, AT THE STATE DINNER IN HONOUR OF PRESIDENT AHTISAARI OF FINLAND IN DUBLIN CASTLE
Mr. President,
I am very pleased to welcome you and Mrs. Ahtisaari and your delegation to Ireland.
Finland and Ireland are now bound together in the European Union. We now share a common future. Though we are remote from each other in a geographical sense our destinies are now intimately connected with each other and with those of our European partners. Membership has brought us from the edge to the centre of Europe. In the short time that we have been members of the Union it has become obvious that we share many goals.
In a short while Ireland will take over the Presidency of the European Union for a six-month period - the fifth time that Ireland will chair the Council of Ministers. We assume this task at a time when the European Union faces many challenges - not least the possibility that the union may expand, within the next number of years, to more than twenty-five states.
We know that Finland has begun to plan already for its Presidency of the European Union in the second half of 1999. We look forward to the continued sharing of experiences and objectives which our common membership of the European Union has allowed to Flourish.
Both Finland and Ireland joined the United Nations in the mid-nineteen fifties. Membership opened up a host of new challenges and new interests. It is remarkable how we found ourselves on the same side of the argument on so many of the great issues and questions of the day. Perhaps our histories had taught us similar lessons!
In Ireland our people take great pride in the contribution we have made to development and to peace keeping under the auspices of the United Nations. Irish troops have been engaged in a very large number of UN peace keeping and humanitarian missions.
Finland also made a very distinguished contribution to UN peace-keeping from the beginning of its UN membership. Irish troops talk with great fondness and great warmth of the joint missions undertaken with their Finnish counterparts in the Lebanon or in Cyprus or in one of the many other areas in which they jointly served and continue to serve the United Nations. They have come to know each other very well and they hold each other in high regard. I might mention here that the current Irish Chief of Staff Lt. General Gerard McMahon served in a United Nations force in the Middle East with General Gustav Hagglund, who is now the Commander of the Finnish armed forces.
Mr. President,
May I also mention your own connection with development and with the United Nations. You devoted yourself to the service of peace in many places but especially in Namibia and in the former Yugoslavia. Your role and your record in those causes is a distinguished and an honourable one. And many Irish people are very happy that they have served with you in your UN missions.
Mr. President,
It is a fact, though not, I admit, one which is widely know, that the two most extensive collections of folklore in Europe are in Finland and in Ireland. The Irish Folklore Commission was found by the late Professor Seamus Ó Duilearga. Writing to a Finnish friend in the late 1940's Ó Duilearga said he first thought of establishing an Irish Folklore Commission when he was visiting Helsinki in the late 1920's. It was the Finnish example which inspired him. He remained to the end very fond of the Finnish scholars with whom he was acquainted. Last year I had the privilege of opening an Irish-Finnish-Estonian colloquium which was held in Maynooth College. It was a very successful event and I should like to use this opportunity to thank the Finnish Ministry of Education for the support they gave on that and on many other occasions.
I am very pleased to note the widespread interest in Finland in Irish music and in Irish culture. The annual Irish music festival, now in its eleventh year, brings Irish musicians to venues all over Finland. It is ably organised by the Helsinki-based Finnish Irish Society.
Our two countries share an interest in literature and theatre. I note that two of Oscar Wilde's plays have been performed this year in Helsinki and I understand that the Helsinki City Theatre will produce Brian Friel's Dancing at Lughnasa in the autumn. I was particularly pleased to learn that the first edition of the Finnish translation of a selection of the poems of Seamus Heaney was sold out before he won the Nobel Prize for Literature.
Bilateral economic relations between our two countries are excellent. The performance of the Finnish economy is impressive. Finnish direct investment makes an important contribution to the Irish economy and Finnish companies in Ireland employ at least 500 people. The accession of Finland to the European Union is already promoting increased trade and tourism between Finland and Ireland.
Mr. President,
Our two countries are small and are at opposite ends of the European continent. Nonetheless in contacts between our two peoples, in international fora such as the United Nations or in the OSCE or elsewhere, it has been obvious that we share a great sympathy for each other, that our analyses and our remedies are more likely to be shared than to be dissimilar. It is clear that we like each other and that we get on well together.
I am certain that this positive and beneficial interaction will deepen and improve in the future, in particular through our shared membership of the European Union.
And now I ask you to join with me in a toast to
THE PRESIDENT AND PEOPLE OF THE REPUBLIC OF FINLAND