Finland, Estonia, and Russia are scheduled to work together to ponder how the countries might avoid violating each other's air space.
Finnish Foreign Minister Ilkka Kanerva (Nat. Coalition Party) said in Brussels on Wednesday that the initiative for a tripartite council came from Russia.
The first meeting of military experts of the three countries is to be held in Finland in November, and will be organised by the Finnish Ministry for Foreign Affairs.
The aim of the process is to find a common policy line toward air space violations which would extend to so-called force majeure situations, such as big thunderstorms that might force changes in flight plans.
Estonia has indicated its willingness to take part in the meeting. Russia's formal confirmation is yet to come.
The most recent violation of Finnish air space was by Russia just under three weeks ago.
At that time a Russian military transport plane flew over Finnish waters off the city of Porvoo for a distance of about 4.5 kilometres. The plane was in Finnish airspace for a few minutes, and a Finnish Air Force jet was scrambled to the area.
The Russian Ambassador to Finland later apologised for the violation. Kanerva said that the documentary evidence presented by Finland on the matter was irrefutable.
Later Russia made its proposal for the establishment of a tripartite group over the matter.
A spate of violations of Finnish airspace occurred in the spring of 2005, when transport planes flying between St. Petersburg and Kaliningrad were said to have flown in Finnish airspace 11 times in a period of just over six months.
Finland sent Russia a diplomatic note and said that in the future, territorial violations by the Russians would be made public. The note was followed by a sharp decline in such violations.
