Policy paper

Joint Declaration on the Strategic Partnership between the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, and the Republic of Finland

Published 21 May 2024

This was published under the 2022 to 2024 Sunak Conservative government

Introduction

We, the Government of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland (‘the UK’) and the Government of the Republic of Finland (‘Finland’), bound by shared democratic values and historic ties, affirm our commitment to strengthening the partnership between our 2 nations.

We are committed to cooperation in multilateral fora to uphold and defend freedom and democracy, free trade, human rights and the rule of law. These shared values are reinforced by our common membership of organisations and platforms, including the United Nations (UN), North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO), the Joint Expeditionary Force (JEF), Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), the international financial institutions, the World Trade Organisation (WTO), and the Council of Europe (CoE), amongst others.

This Joint Declaration aims to recognise and broaden our links including and beyond those outlined in the UK-Finland Statement of 11 May 2022.

Our cooperation is consistent with Finland’s EU membership and with the Trade and Cooperation Agreement between the UK and the EU, and benefits from the wider UK-EU partnership including the signing of the Windsor Framework and the UK’s association to the Horizon Europe and Copernicus programmes. Both the UK and Finland see the positive development of that relationship as supportive of our bilateral efforts. Furthermore, we recognise the importance of Europe jointly addressing pan-European issues, including through the format of the European Political Community.

This Joint Declaration sets out our ambition to enhance our bilateral relationship, across global issues, foreign and security policy, defence, economic cooperation, migration, energy, environment and climate, education, science, research, innovation and technology, and people-to-people links. We will focus on the following areas:

Global and multilateral cooperation

The UK and Finland have forged a strong partnership, based on shared values and in support of freedom and democracy, human rights, free trade, multilateralism, an open and stable rules-based international order, and the rule of law. We emphasise the importance of an effective and efficient multilateral system with a strong UN as its cornerstone. We are committed to deepening our ties to tackle global challenges.

We reaffirm our mutual commitment to the promotion of a rules-based international order. We recognise that multilateral agreements provide legal certainty and predictability on a global and regional scale, and we will work together to advance effective multilateralism.

Putin’s Russia is the most significant and direct threat to our security and to peace and stability in the Euro-Atlantic area. Russia’s illegal, full-scale war of aggression against Ukraine has fundamentally changed the European security environment and is a flagrant violation of international law, the UN Charter and the principles of territorial integrity and sovereignty. It underlines the importance of our partnership and the need to deny Russia any benefit from the war it started. Our ongoing military, political, humanitarian, economic and legal support will help Ukraine to defeat Russia’s illegal invasion and rebuild its prosperity and ability to deter future Russian aggression. We remain committed to holding those responsible to account for the most serious international crimes, including through our support to the International Criminal Court.

The UK and Finland are committed to standing together to support Ukraine, both multilaterally and bilaterally, including through providing military aid and the training of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, through operations such as INTERFLEX and EUMAM Ukraine, and by providing civilian material assistance. We are equally committed to supporting Ukraine’s recovery, reconstruction, and modernisation. We will work together to unlock Ukraine’s economic growth by helping mobilise private sector investment. We will also explore further opportunities for bilateral cooperation to support Ukraine to rebuild and continue its reforms.

The UK and Finland commit to deepening our dialogue on workstrands related to Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine and its consequences. We will work together to counter Russian disinformation, malicious cyber activities, hybrid threats and campaigns and all other efforts to destabilise our societies. We will cooperate and share expertise on sanctions, their implementation and combatting sanctions evasion and circumvention.

Recognising that the prosperity and security of the Euro-Atlantic and Indo-Pacific regions are linked, Finland and the UK will work to develop partnerships between Europe and the Indo-Pacific, including through the implementation of the EU and UK’s Indo-Pacific Strategies. We will further our cooperation on responding to China as a systemic challenge, while standing ready to engage China where it is consistent with our national interests and security. We will continue to press China, and other actors, to play a constructive role in response to Russia’s illegal invasion of Ukraine and not to provide material or other assistance to Russia.

The UK and Finland will continue to work together on shared international development priorities and to deliver accelerated progress on the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and the promotion of peaceful, stable and open societies. We will continue cooperation through the Nordic Plus grouping and multilateral fora to foster political dialogue and coordination around key development issues. We will also continue to engage bilaterally as likeminded development partners promoting policy exchange and coordination and delivering ambitious joint impact on shared priorities.

Bilaterally and in multilateral fora, the UK and Finland will identify further opportunities to strengthen development cooperation to promote poverty reduction and the SDGs.

We will maintain a strong joint commitment to gender equality, particularly strengthening Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights (SRHR), preventing, eliminating and condemning sexual, gender-based and conflict-related sexual violence and fighting against rollback of LGBT+ rights. We will seek to ensure that the UN Human Rights Council is at the forefront of this action and continue to call for accountability for human rights violations and abuses.

We are committed to fostering effective judicial cooperation between the UK and Finland. We will enhance judicial cooperation based on agreements and conventions that apply between the UK and Finland.

We remain committed to preventing and combatting corruption. We will enhance our cooperation through multilateral fora and explore opportunities to strengthen our mutual dialogue and collaboration in anti-corruption matters. 

We recognise the importance of fostering better regulation policy in order to develop legislative drafting and to ensure a high quality regulatory environment. We will foster a dialogue on further developing regulatory policy.

Security and defence cooperation

As long-standing partners and as NATO Allies, the UK and Finland are committed to deepening our partnership on security and defence and to promoting security and stability in the Euro-Atlantic area, including in the Baltic Sea, the Arctic and the North Atlantic. We will continue to build on our strong bilateral defence partnership, underpinned by our Framework Arrangement for Enhanced UK-Finnish Defence Co-operation and the UK-Finland Statement, both signed in 2022.

NATO remains the cornerstone of Euro-Atlantic security and the bedrock of collective defence. We recognise Finland’s NATO membership enhances Euro-Atlantic security, fortifies the Alliance as a whole and reinforces NATO’s capabilities. It also strengthens the security of Northern Europe and the Baltic Sea region.

Through NATO, the UK and Finland will maintain a consistent dialogue on all aspects of deterrence and defence as well as the NATO agenda more broadly. We will work together to ensure the Alliance benefits from Finland’s expertise in the Northern European including Baltic Sea and the Arctic operational environments, resilience, comprehensive security approach, cyber defence, and technology.

The UK and Finland will seek to deepen industrial collaboration to ensure that NATO and its partners continue to generate strategic advantage in an increasingly contested environment. This includes defence innovation in vital strategic areas like cyber, cryptography and security. We will continue to explore opportunities for greater industrial equipment and materiel collaboration (including in cyber and cryptography). We will collaborate on research, development and innovation bilaterally and through multilateral initiatives such as the Defence Innovation Accelerator for North Atlantic (DIANA), NATO Innovation Fund (NIF) and EU programmes and initiatives when possible.

We will continue to work closely together on a wide range of security and defence issues both bilaterally, as well as through the JEF and the Northern Group. This includes maintaining regular military training and exercising in support of collective defence and interoperability. The JEF provides an additional tier of security in Northern Europe and complements NATO. Building on the JEF vision agreed by leaders of JEF nations in October 2023, the UK and Finland will continue to work together to strengthen the JEF, building interoperability and military options in response to potential security challenges in its core regions of the High North, North Atlantic and Baltic Sea.

Enhancing stability and strengthening deterrence in Northern Europe is a key priority for both of our countries. A strategic landscape in Europe where we face multiple threats below and above the threshold for armed conflict requires an integrated approach across all relevant policy areas to ensure the strongest possible deterrence against aggression and malign activities. We will enhance our cooperation to counter the full spectrum of future threats and challenges, including through building societal and institutional resilience.

We will work together, and hold regular consultations, to improve our partnership to fight terrorist threats at home and overseas, and to stand ready to assist each other in the event of a terrorist incident. We will also continue to collaborate in combatting organised crime. We are committed to continued collaboration in areas such as intelligence sharing, to create shared situational awareness regarding the challenges that threaten our security, including countering hybrid activities, cyber threats, disinformation campaigns and protecting critical infrastructure in all spheres. We will also continue to explore opportunities for greater security, defence and cyber industrial collaboration.

We will continue our close cyber dialogue and exchange of best practices on respective cyber strategies as responsible actors in cyberspace. We will bolster our collaboration to strengthen our ability and readiness to deter, prevent, detect and respond to malicious cyber activities against our national core values and functions vital to our societies, including democratic processes, capabilities vital to our defence, and protection of critical infrastructure.

The UK and Finland will continue to closely cooperate on non-proliferation and arms control. This will include effective co-ordination of multilateral efforts at NATO, the International Atomic Energy Agency and other fora to address broad non-proliferation and disarmament challenges. It will also include addressing proliferation challenges from Iran and the DPRK as well as the safety, security and safeguard implications of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

We will strengthen EU-NATO cooperation on defence and security, recognising the importance of the EU and its defence initiatives for Euro-Atlantic security. We will also intensify our co-operation on European security through the OSCE. We aim to preserve its principles, values and instruments, enhance the effectiveness of its confidence and security building mechanisms, and support all participating States to meet their OSCE commitments.

The UK and Finland will set up an enhanced regular dialogue to focus and deepen our cooperation on security policy.

Economic cooperation

The UK and Finland reaffirm our commitment to promote common prosperity through economic openness, and our rejection of protectionism. We strongly support the rules-based multilateral trading system, with the WTO at its heart, and will address barriers to trade which hinder the development of our economic and trade cooperation.

We will support engagement between our respective government institutions, regulators, companies, and civil society to help strengthen bilateral economic cooperation and increase the volume of our bilateral trade and investment.

We will continue to work together to share expertise and best practice on environmental goods and services, digitalisation and technology, energy, and on economic security of supply, critical national infrastructure, copyright issues, investment screening and business engagement.

We will support the strengthening and deepening of economic relationships including but not limited to: 6G development; quantum computing; artificial intelligence; communication networks, both terrestrial and in space (through communication networks for satellites); semiconductors and defence materiel. We recognise critical minerals are key to economic security and developing key technologies, and we will build on our existing collaboration in this field.

Migration

The UK and Finland remain committed to tackling irregular migration and strengthening cooperation with European partners. We recognise the challenges facing Europe from irregular migration and remain committed to combatting migrant smuggling and human trafficking that puts lives at risk, disrespecting human life and dignity in the pursuit of profit.

We note the need for closer bilateral and EU-UK cooperation, including between relevant EU and UK agencies, to prevent irregular departures, to combat migrant smuggling and organised immigration crime, to support returns and readmission to countries of origin, and to enhance migration management along the routes into and across Europe.  We agree the EU and UK should work together to close down the supply chains of the organised criminal gangs facilitating irregular migration, including by taking measures to stop the actors involved in migrant smuggling.

We commit to countering the instrumentalisation of migration as a tool of hybrid influencing operations and will aim to strengthen our legal frameworks and international cooperation to clearly identify and separate these malicious actions from legitimate, regulated asylum policies.

We recognise the importance of strengthening Europe’s borders and addressing irregular migration and the fight against organised immigration crime in international and European fora.  Success is dependent on a partnered and holistic whole-of-route approach to tackle irregular migration and the people smugglers and other actors who profit from misery. The UK and Finland will share best practice and consider what more can be done. Together we will enhance migration management through closely working with international institutions that can help effective and sustainable solutions.

Energy, environment and climate cooperation

Building upon a shared legacy of environmental stewardship and innovation, the UK and Finland recommit to continued collaboration on climate action and tackling environmental degradation, biodiversity loss and pollution. We will work together to advocate for greater ambition to tackle climate change, reverse ocean degradation, cease the decline of biodiversity, and mitigate the introduction of pollutants into the environment. We will aim to deliver accelerated progress on the UN Sustainable Development Goals, the Paris Agreement and the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework.

Together, we will accelerate action in the energy sector to reach Net Zero greenhouse gas emissions in accordance with our respective national targets, including solutions for security of energy supply, civil nuclear energy, low carbon hydrogen in industrial decarbonisation and energy storage, as well as heating and cooling. We will also work together to enhance regional energy resilience, including through validating crisis response procedures. We recognise the need to peak global emissions by 2025 and for all Parties to the Paris Agreement to have ambitious, Paris-aligned 2030 Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) and to communicate new NDCs by 2025, taking into account the outcome of COP28 in Dubai.

To end plastic pollution globally, we will continue our efforts towards an ambitious outcome in the negotiations for a legally binding instrument on plastic pollution, including in the marine environment.

We remain committed to contributing to international climate finance, on mitigation as well as adaptation, and unlocking increased finance for nature and mitigation of pollution. We will seek ways to further mobilise additional private capital to this end. We will work towards agreeing a New Collective Quantified Goal at COP29, as well as continue to ensure that International Financial Institutions are reformed so that the world can deliver the billions of climate finance needed.

The UK and Finland are committed to working towards the 6 Helsinki Principles of the Coalition of Finance Ministers for Climate Action. We will continue efforts to ensure economic, fiscal and financial planning is part of the global response to address the twin threats of climate change and biodiversity decline.

Both governments acknowledge the importance of nuclear power plants and the potential for new and emerging nuclear energy technologies in achieving Net Zero. We will work together to encourage business and industrial collaboration to jointly leverage our complementary nuclear capabilities to accelerate the deployment of Small Modular Reactors (SMRs) in our respective nations as well as exploring opportunities for joint exports to third markets in Europe in future. We reaffirm the importance of strengthening the nuclear fuel supply chain in Europe.

The UK and Finland will continue to work to support the UN Secretary General’s Early Warnings for All initiative. We recognise the value of early warning systems as a cost-effective way to help countries build resilience to extreme weather events caused by climate change. The UK and Finland are founding members of the Risk-informed Early Action Partnership (REAP) and funders of the Climate Risk and Early Warning Systems-initiative (CREWS). The Finnish Meteorological Institute and the UK Met Office will continue to implement bilateral projects to improve weather, climate and early warning systems in developing countries and Least Developed Countries, including through the Systematic Observations Finance Facility (SOFF).

The UK and Finland reaffirm their support to the Glasgow Leaders Declaration on Forests and Land Use. We will work together to build increased global awareness of how sustainable forest management and the bio-based economy play an important part in responding to the climate crisis. We emphasise the leading role of Europe in the green transition and the bioeconomy, recognising the forest-based bioeconomy and forestry sector present significant opportunities to mitigate greenhouse gas emissions.

We recognise the connection between improved health and welfare of farmed animals and sustainable food production systems and commit to exchanging information, expertise and experience in the field of animal health and welfare.

Cooperation in education, science, research, innovation and technology

The UK and Finland are home to world-leading researchers, innovators and higher education institutions. We recognise the fundamental importance of collaboration in these sectors to address the key challenges of our times.

We consider high quality education contributes to the innovation capabilities of our nations and is a key element in making full use of new technologies. We will continue to share knowledge and expertise in developing education systems that reskill and upskill our labour forces and support innovation in STEM education. 

To strengthen the position of the UK and Finland as global innovation leaders, we will foster cooperation to innovate in new technologies. We will promote the sustainable, secure and safe design, development, deployment and use of new and emerging technologies. This includes the fields of artificial intelligence (AI), high performance computing, quantum technologies, space, cyber security and defence applications, 6G and future telecoms technologies, engineering biology and the bioeconomy, and semiconductor technologies. We will identify opportunities for collaboration aimed at strengthening the resilience of critical supply chains.  We will also cooperate to ensure that a robust export control mechanism continues to remain in place to ensure the secure and sustainable trade in sensitive technologies. We will consider ways to exchange information related to export licences.

Together, we will also focus on tackling shared challenges and accelerating development in key areas of human and planetary health, life sciences, anti-microbial resistance, climate science and the green transition.

We will work together to shape the global use and development of technologies through international regulations and governance, and norms around our shared values and principles. We also agree to share experience on research security and responsible internationalisation of research.

Recognising the importance of intellectual property rights as a driver for innovative science and technology, we commit to ensuring a balanced and effective level of protection of intellectual property rights, including providing the means for enforcing such rights. To that end, we will stand together in our support for the WTO Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) Agreement.

We strongly encourage collaboration between higher education institutions, research organisations and companies, notably through the EU Framework Programmes for Research and Innovation. We recognise the benefits of student, researcher and staff mobility for the quality of higher education, research and innovation and collaboration and we will work together to enhance those exchanges and mobility between the UK and Finland.

People-to-people

To bring our societies closer, Finland and the UK will endeavour to strengthen people-to-people links by exploring opportunities to enhance youth mobility and cultural exchange. Recognising the people-to-people links between our peoples and the desire to strengthen these further, we will foster ongoing cooperation in both civil and family matters as an essential underpinning to enabling people to live, study and work in our respective countries. We will identify obstacles in people-to-people contacts and seek solutions to overcome them.

Governance and implementation

We commit to engage in regular bilateral dialogue at all levels. Both parties will aim to meet annually at ministerial level, underpinned by consultations at expert level across the areas identified in this Joint Declaration, and overseen in general by the Director Generals Europe.

Our Ambassadors and representatives from our respective ministries will lead on the implementation of this Joint Declaration. Bilateral arrangements made under the framework of this Joint Declaration will be further coordinated and progress reported to relevant Ministers and senior officials.

Legal

This declaration represents the political will of the Governments of the UK and Finland and does not give rise to any rights or obligations under domestic or international law, nor does it preclude future new areas of cooperation that may be identified and agreed by the Governments. The activities set forth in this declaration will be implemented in line with Finnish and UK legislation, as well as applicable international law, including the obligations arising from Finland’s membership of the European Union.

The foregoing record represents the understandings reached between the Government of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland and the Government of the Republic of Finland upon the matters referred to therein.

Signed in duplicate in London on 20 May 2024 in the English language.