Statement to the Press by the Prime
Minister of Estonia
after his meeting with the President of
the Republic
Allow me to thank the President, my
very dear friend and colleague.
This is my first official visit as a
Prime Minister to this beautiful country that might be somewhat distant from
Estonia geographically but very close in many other aspects.
The very practical result for our visit
is the closer cooperation on ICT field. Estonia believes that anything we have
experienced in developing e-governance systems is worth sharing, and if there
are countries committed to take their public administration to the next level by
using digital services, we are going to help and contribute as much as we can
and of course this Memorandum of Understanding gives both the Estonian experts
and ICT companies the opportunity to show what is our experience and if you find
it useful for you to do something similar.
Estonian experience says that only from
signing documents digitally we save every year 2% of GDP and on top of that you
can also add all kinds of other digital services that help the lives of citizens
better and more convenient and by giving the government a better overview of how
things work and adding transparency to public administration.
I have been here today half a day, and
throughout this half a day I have seen a great deal of hope, and I am joining
you in this hope of seeing Cyprus reunited. Let me say out loud and clear that
Estonia very much supports the efforts that you have undertaken to really make
this country united again and this is not only an important issue here but this
is a very-very important European issue.
I really hope that really soon we will
see results and I am keeping my fingers crossed.
What I have also seen is a success
story in coming out of the economic crisis and I remember it was quite recently
when the crisis hit very-very hard both in Estonia but also here in Cyprus and
even more recently I remember lots of people all around EU saying very
pessimistic notes about Cyprus economy and you and your government have
successfully proved them wrong and you have brought a role model for many others
who have been in difficult situation economically and you have made a very clear
point that by reforming, by introducing a balance budget there is a way out of
crisis. So I really respect you for doing that and I know reforming and getting
the economy back on track is never easy and never a 100% popular solution, but
this is a needed one and I admire what you have done here in this respect.
Naturally we have talked about security
here in this region, but also the wider and transatlantic security.
I fully agree with the President that
the issue of Ukraine and the issue of invasion in Ukraine should be on the table
as long as we see a full implementation of the Minsk agreements.
My next visit tomorrow will be to Kiev
and I will talk to the Prime Minster and will tell him the same thing I am
telling you here, I believe that in 21 st century Europe we cannot
tolerate that some countries think that they are spheres of influence or have
the ability to change borders by force. So, I am very thankful for your
solidarity in this matter and that we see things similarly that the full
implementation of Minsk agreement is very much needed.
Of course on migration it is also
critical to cooperate, even if they countries are very distant in geography, we
need to join efforts to fight the root causes and it is our duty to keep the
solution coming closer and to find a way out of that crisis as well. We know
that the solutions are not always easy, but we know that we are both willing to
contribute and to be very-very committed in finding solutions.
It is an honor and a pleasure being
here and I hope that very soon when I come back I will come back to a reunified
Cyprus.
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