COMMENT: Is anyone coming to dinner?
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By Anna Paljakka
The whole world will not be coming to visit Finland - not even the whole continent of Europe - when Finland holds the EU Presidency. Most of the meetings will be held far away from Finland, mainly in Brussels.
This happened already seven years ago when Finland first held the EU Presidency. After that, EU activities, including its summits, have been increasingly concentrated on Brussels.
Brussels will be the venue of a total of about 3,300 meetings, which will be presided over by Finland.
About 130 meetings will be held in Finland, says Anja Vilo, head of the secretariat of the Finnish EU Presidency.
The number includes small meetings of working groups whose participants usually arrive in the morning and leave in the evening.
There is also the two-day Asia Europe Meeting, on September 10th - 11th, which will be the largest summit-level meeting ever held in Finland.
It is possible that an unofficial EU summit concerning energy questions will be held somewhere in Finland.
Nevertheless, the grim truth is that the EU Presidency will not bring foreign guests to every Finnish community, or even to every province to sample our local delicacies.
Helsingin Sanomat / First published in print 11.5.2006
More on this subject:
 Proximity to nature - a major theme of Finnish EU cuisine
ANNA PALJAKKA / Helsingin Sanomat
anna.paljakka@kaapeli.fi
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