During their working meeting, First Deputy Foreign Minister Vladimir Titov and Finish Foreign Minister Timo Juhani Soini noted that their countries had similar approaches to the need to step up multilateral cooperation in Northern Europe and the Arctic, the Russian Foreign Ministry website reports.

The statement reads: "The officials pointed to the similarity in the Russian and Finnish approaches to the need to build up multilateral cooperation in Northern Europe and the Arctic, in particular in light of Finland's active position as part of its two-year Chairmanship of the Arctic Council, as well as to maintain the Baltic and the North as a zone of stability with a lower level of tensions than in other world regions."

The talks were held as part of the regional meeting of Russian ambassadors to Northern European and Baltic countries, with the Russian Foreign Ministry's representatives in St. Petersburg and Kaliningrad also in attendance, at the Russian Embassy in Helsinki.