INTERVIEW Finnish Minister for the EU Tytti Tuppurainen on justice in Romania, Schengen accession and the war in Russia

Tytti Tuppurainen, Finnish Minister for European Affairs, said in an interview with G4Media that Romania must continue reforms in justice and the fight against corruption. She said the European Commission’s assessments show that Romania has done its homework and deserves to be welcomed into Schengen.

Tuppurainen warned, however, that Romania must continue to invest in the fight against corruption and human trafficking. „Corruption erodes the credibility of the whole political system and at the end people won’t trust anything and they are vulnerable when it comes to conspiracy theories,” the Finnish official said.

So with a lot of EU instruments in place, as well as financial instruments like the Recovery Fund, I think we should all monitor very carefully that the money is going to the right place. And we also have milestones that we are watching, and the money will not be paid out unless the milestones in the National Recovery and Resilience Plan (NRRP) are achieved.

Rep: We all know the Schengen issue for Romania how important it is. As finland is in a very close political relationship with Sweden, how do you assess the possibility to have this topic back on the EU Council agenda during the Swedish presidency?

Tytti Tuppurainen: I have to say that I hope that this decision will be made very soon. Because I think Romania meets all the relevant criteria and once you meet the criteria the conclusion should be adopted. So there is no reason to hesitate anymore. I think it would also be a sign of sort of european movement of further integration within the EU that the Shenghen area becomes larger.

Romania and Bulgaria – according to the European Commission assessments – have fulfiled all the standards by far, so Finland is in favor of that and we hope that we could make the decision in the EU Council as soon as possible. Sweden has the presidency and of course it is up to the presidency to find out whether there is the willingness to make the decision. According to my sources it is only Austria that is pending the decision in the case of Romania and there are some concerns also from the Netherlands when it comes to Bulgaria and we are trying to convince our european partners to move on this issue because now it is the time to see unity and determination ON the face of the Russian aggression. EU has to be able to make a decision.

 

Rep: But in the last decade, Finland was rather reluctant when when it came to the Schengen enlargement with both Bulgaria and Romania due to the rule of law concerns. What happened last year, why did you change your position?

Tytti Tuppurainen: We base our european policies on facts. And if facts change, then we change our mind. That is the key principle of our decision making and we always base our european assessments on the judgment of the European Commission. We as a country we don’t have the means to scrutinize certain country on a particular issue, its the Commission who does that. And the European Commission has said that Romania and Bulgaria both countries and also Croatia meet all the relevant criteria.

When it comes to rule of law, I think the process is never ending and this was actually the wording of the justice minister of Romania whom i met earlier this morning. He was very impressive in his approach towards the rule of law reforms in Romania and I encourage you to to further continue them not just because of the requirements of the EU but for the good of the Romanian society, for the good of the Romanian people and for the good for the Romanian businesses.

 

Rep: But are you really convinced that the new Romanian justice laws are the right solution? If you look at this the last CVM report it seems like a positive one, but when you look deeper you see a lot of new requirements. Also, there is a lot of criticism from the Venice Commission?

Tytti Tuppurainen: We encourage you to to further continue work on that field. If there is criticism one has to acknowledge that and accelerate the reforms and remedy if needed and the impression i got from the justice minister is that the intention was the right kind that Romania wants to further improve its performance in the field of rule of law. And i think it is worth investing in this reforms because its for the good of your society also for your businesses. Politics is important and democracy has a role to play, but when it comes to justice system it has to be objective and one hundred percent neutral. Politicians shall not interfere in the business of courts and and trials and and judges work. They have to be able to work independently from the current government or politics whatsoever. So this is an issue that we all need to nurture all the time. Even the most progressive countries if i may, finland also, we need to pay attention to this issue all the time.

 

Rep: You said you were impressed by the discourse of our justice minister, but Romania has quite a long history of double speech – saying what the EU and our partners want to hear but doing something else at home.

Tytti Tuppurainen: The European Commission has the duty to monitor the situation in the member states and we encourage the Commission to do that work in a profound manner. And actually at the moment EU has proper instruments in place to help to remedy if there are concerns in a particular country. There are many different instruments in our rule of law a toolbox.

 

Rep: You mean the mechanism that is connecting the EU money to the rule of law?

Tytti Tuppurainen: Exactly. When Finland had the presidency of the European Union in 2019, it was the priority of our presidency to have that kind of regulation – the conditionality mechanism.

 

Rep: So you think it is effective?

Tytti Tuppurainen: It is effective and now, for the first time ever, the Council has decided to implement that in the case of Hungary and I am grateful to notice that we were bold enough, that the Commission was bold enough to propose and that the Council was bold enough to implement that.

But that is not the only rule of law tool that we have. We also have the Article 7 procedures and we have ongoing procedures with Hungary and Poland. They have a value in theirselves. It is important that ministers meet and we can have these hearings and address the problems in the member states. We are not ignoring them, we are not saying that this is business as usual and its very important that also the Swedish presidency arranges Article 7 hearings and they continue for as along as necessary.

Then we have the independent European Court of Justice that can also intervene if there are problems. And lets not forget the rule of law dialogue. And the basis of the rule of law dialogue in the Council is the annual rule of law report by the European Commission. And we just had the dialogue country specific discussion in the council in december regarding Romania and in the Commission report there are also recommendations for each country. So I think this new annual rule of law report by the Commission and the following rule of law dialogue in the Council are also valuable when it comes to addressing problems. So should there be problems in Romania – which of course i do not hope – we have proper instruments in place in the EU to address them.

 

Rep: Did you have specific concerns addressed during your meeting with the the Romanian justice minister?

Tytti Tuppurainen: Well, anticorruption work is something that Romania needs to invest further in. It is very important to improve anticorruption instruments and also anti-human trafficking work is something that its unfortunately very timely and relevant.

 

Rep: Do you have a problem in Finland with Romanians being trafficked abroad?

Tytti Tuppurainen: I don’t have any particular figures when it comes to that, this is an issue that we all need to pay attention especially now that we received millions of Ukrainian refugees, women, young girls, children. So forced labor is a problem and also women being exploited sexually is also a problem that we need to address together at the European level but also domestically.

 

Rep: Coming back to the anticorruption fight, how do you assess the Romanian anticorruption efforts in the last two – three years, do you see an evolution in good or in bad?

Tytti Tuppurainen: It is not for me to judge. We hope that the European Commission is up to its duties, monitoring the member states works in that field. But I certainly hope for the good of Romania that you are fighting corruption because corruption is very harmful and detrimental for your own society and country. It erodes the credibility of the whole political system and at the end people won’t trust anything and they are vulnerable when it comes to conspiracy theories and so on.

So having a lot of EU instruments in place, also financial instruments like the Recovery Fund, I think we should all monitor very carefully that the money goes in the right place. And we have also milestones that we follow and the money won’t be paid unless the milestones in your national recovery and resilience plan (PNRR) are not reached.

It is up to the national authority to see that that money don’t go into wrong places. When we decided in the EU Council that we will create this Recovery Fund, we also decided an emergency brake. So, if it seems like one country would be you know misusing this financial aid, then if one country requests this issue can be taken up to the European Council. So, it is a very powerful emergency brake that we have to prevent the misuse of our European funds.

It is also very important for the sake of taxpayer’s interest in the in the net payer countries. Finland is also a net payer, not a big one but nevertheless. I have to, as minister for European Affairs, take into account our taxpayers’ expectations.

Every country needs to fight against corruption and we have to make sure that the money is spent how we are intending to spend it: on green transition and on digitalization. These two issues they are the European big strategies that we all need to work on.

 

Rep: Do you have question marks regarding how the recipient countries are using this European money?

Tytti Tuppurainen: Well, I think that also one of the issues that the European Commission had in mind when decided to propose halting the cohesion fund in the case of Hungary and implementing the rule of law conditionality and mechanism so probably anticorruption legislation and regulations in Hungary they are very relevant if they want to come back to their financing. Now 6,3 billion euros are being suspended and hopefully it will help to make the necessary corrections in their system because it is very important that we don’t lose the money.

Corruption is something that really rottens a society. Think of Russia: it has invested massively in its military capabilities, massive spending in the military, but the money has gone to oligarchs and now Putin is in trouble because the oligarchs have the money in their pockets.

 

Rep: How do you assess Romania’s efforts to help Finland and Sweden with their accession to NATO? Do you feel that Romania did something particular in order to help?

Tytti Tuppurainen: In my bilateral consultations today with minister Aurescu I was impressed by his determination to help Finland and we are grateful for the efforts by the Romanian foreign minister and the Romanian political leadership to help us to get into NATO. There are only two countries pending – Hungary and Turkey. All the others have already ratified and we thank Romania for your swift ratification already during the summer. It is a sign of commitment and sign of solidarity that we need at this point.

Now Viktor Orban has said that Hungary will ratify February 1^st and we take prime ministers declaration as a word so we count on that and we expect Hungary to ratify. Then there is Turkey, and we have a trilateral memorandum that was signed in Madrid NATO summit and I believe that we have implemented everything that was listed and we hope Turkey will be convinced as soon as possible that that its worth ratifying our accession treaty.

There are also other aspects in the issue but of course it is up to president Erdogan to make his decision and then ratify.

 

Rep: Do you expect a decision from president Erdogan until the presidential elections in Turkey?

Tytti Tuppurainen: It is not for me to set any timetables. I hope that Turkey will ratify as soon as possible. I think it is also a matter of credibility of the whole alliance because NATO has said repeatedly that its open-door policy is valid and once it is valid and once you have two applicant countries who meet all the relevant criteria then the alliance should be able to make the decisions in a united manner.

 

Rep: Did this effort of the Romanian government in helping Finland and Sweden with Turkey played a role in Finland being more in favor of Romania’s entry to Schengen. Were they connected?

Tytti Tuppurainen: In this time, it is very important to show solidarity. Europe is united and we need to show understanding towards each other. We need to act in a reciprocal way, but this is not to say that I would consider this to be some sort of a horse trade. It is not. I believe honestly that once the European Commission has assessed the situation of Romania, then it is a neutral assessment of the situation and we rely our judgment on the Commission’s proposal. So, I believe Romania has done its homework. Romania has an external border and Finland has also an external border so we can understand each other. And I believe that once you are a member in the Schengen area it could increase the border security of the whole union.

 

Rep: So you trust the assessment of the Commission that Romania is prepared t protect the external border?

Tytti Tuppurainen: Yes.

 

Rep: Besides Nokian, do you do you know other Finnish companies that have the intention to move their operations from Russia or Ukraine to Romania?

Tytti Tuppurainen: I think Romania is a very attractive investment destination and we have to make sure that the single market of the European Union is a genuine one, that we have a level playing field and I am happy to take notice that Romania is a likeminded country when it comes to the single market and the fair and transparent rules in in the single market.

So many companies are now withdrawing from the Russian market. Nokian Tires is one of the state-owned companies. It is important that the companies withdraw the operation from the Russian market as part isolating Russia as a consequence of the war of aggression in Ukraine. So Romania could then gain from this new wage of investment in Europe.

I would suggest that you in Romania pay attention to the level of education, something that you could further strengthen – primary education and early education. It is worth investing in education in order to have a skilled labor force, European companies need a skilled labor.

 

Rep: Finland is one of the very few countries in the world who know how to defeat Russia in the battlefield. What Ukraine should learn from your experience?

Tytti Tuppurainen: I think there are many similarities between our winter war against Soviet Russia in 1939 and Russia aggression in Ukraine. Both Stalin and now Putin have been surprised to see a united nation against them. So Stalin thought that he would see a fragmented society, Putin thought that he would see a fragmented society. But instead both men united a country in a tremendous manner. So I think Ukrainians are a role model for all of us. Their fight is the bravest one and we should really pay tribute to that and we should intensify our aid to Ukraine, including heavy arms and ammunition.

I think if there is a European solution where we could deliver also Leopard tanks, countries would follow, including Finland. Ukrainians need to win the war; we cannot let Putin win the war. Russia must be defeated and we must help Ukraine to win the WAR. They have the determination, they have the will to fight for the country, but they desperately need more weapons, they need arms, ammunition.

 

Rep: Do you have any positive signs from Germany when it comes to the Leopard thanks?

Tytti Tuppurainen: We have also Leopard tanks in Finland. There are consultations but of course they are very sensitive one. I believe personally, that should it come to a European solution that countries would together provide the tanks, I believe that countries would then follow. Now it is time to stand with Ukraine also in a practical manner.