Finland’s new ambassador to Dominica, Jukka Pietikainen, has expressed his country’s solidarity with Dominica as the island recovers from the ravages of Hurricane Maria.
He presented his credentials to President of Dominica His Excellency Charles Savarin earlier this week.
“I want to start by expressing the solidarity of Finland to the Government, communities and people of Dominica, for the devastation left by Hurricane Maria,” he said. “It caused even greater destruction than Tropical Storm Erika which struck Dominica two years earlier.”
He stated that Finland has supported and continues to support the goal of building climate resilient Caribbean countries and his country responded and assisted Dominica after the passage of the hurricane.
“Finland deployed rapidly a technical support team to Dominica to build up the communication system for the emergency teams immediately after the storm. As one of the leading donors, our core funding to the UN, in particular to the UN Central Emergency Relief Fund, Finish funds were injected from the beginning to help the Caribbean countries in need after the two category five hurricanes,” he stated.
He said that although Finland and Dominica are far from each other, the distance will not prevent the two countries from having warm relations.
“I am determined to visit Dominica as often as needed to help build the relations between our two countries,” Pietikainen, who is based in Helsinki, the capital of Finland, said. “Our countries may be geographically distant from each other, but it has not prevented us from creating warm relations based on mutual respect and sovereign equality of nations.”
*Finnish funds, not Finish funds.