Niinistö, Biden meet at HW, discuss NATO, Ukraine

President Sauli Niinistö on Thursday met his United States counterpart Joseph R. Biden at White House in Washington and discussed various issues including Russia´s invasion of Ukraine and Finland. Sweden´s NATO membership process.

“A good and important conversation with President Joe Biden today (Thursday) at the White House. I thanked him for his leadership and strong support to Finland in our NATO process. We also discussed our continued support to Ukraine,” Niinistö wrote in a twitter post after the meeting.

Meeting with Biden was not in the schedule of Niinistö´s visit to USA but it took place suddenly following an initiative taken by White House.

On Thursday, the President also met U.S. Senators, among others.

Niinistö started his visit to the United States on Monday and his visit will end on Friday through visiting the Naval Station Norfolk and meeting with Governor of the State of Virginia Glenn Youngkin.

Earlier on Monday, the President met Governor of the State of Washington Jay Inslee and attended a joint session of the State Senate, where he gave an address on transatlantic cooperation in the areas of security, technology and economy.

On Tuesday, the President was in Palo Alto in order and participated in a discussion on security policy, great power competition and new technologies, organised by the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies at Stanford University.

At a meeting with California Lieutenant Governor Eleni Kounalakis, Niinistö also discussed the international political situation and the green and digital transition.