Refugee crisis addressed at the Nordic Council Session

19.10.15 | News
Harpa
“We must urgently develop the tools to process asylum seekers and streamline our current process, which is often protracted and resource intensive. It could be to our advantage if we could jointly develop new and more efficient procedures for this purpose,” explains the President of the Nordic Council, Höskuldur Þórhallsson, who has great expectations of this year’s Session in Reykjavik from 27 to 29 October.

The Session is the largest Nordic forum of the year for dialogue among politicians, prime ministers and departmental ministers from throughout the Nordic Region.

“Going forward, we must work to ensure that the refugees granted asylum in the Nordic Region  are able to settle quickly and are given the opportunity to utilise their skills  to the benefit of themselves and society. This is an area where we can strengthen the exchange of experience between the Nordic countries and learn from each other,” Þórhallsson  continued.

At the Nordic Council Session, the Nordic prime ministers will attend meetings with each other and with the Nordic Council Presidium. The ministers for Nordic co-operation and ministers for foreign affairs will also meet with the Presidium. Additionally there will be several meetings of the departmental ministers during the course of the Session. The very first politicians’ question time, featuring all of the Nordic Region’s ministers for the environment, will take place on Wednesday 28 October, featuring all of the Nordic Region’s ministers for the environment.

“Going forward, we must work to ensure that the refugees granted asylum in the Nordic Region  are able to settle quickly and are given the opportunity to utilise their skills  to the benefit of themselves and society. This is an area where we can strengthen the exchange of experience between the Nordic countries and learn from each other.”

 

Resolving the crisis together

How can we facilitate closer co-operation in the Nordic Region? This question will be addressed by the Nordic prime ministers during the summit of Nordic Council politicians. The summit opens this year’s Session, the overall theme of which is international politics in a Nordic perspective.

“No country can solve these challenges by itself. This is why the prime ministers of the Nordic countries are pursuing a common path for Europe. The first step will be to try to find common ground in the Nordic Region in terms of broader co-operation in Europe, as well as how we can solve problems arising on the borders between the Nordic countries. We also need to increase support for the UN and others bodies striving to create better conditions for refugees in areas bordering Syria,” Þórhallsson explains.

The Under-Secretary-General of the UN, Christian Friis Bach, will open the debate on international policy in Reykjavik on 28 October. The refugee crisis is being addressed in the context of the UN’s global objectives for sustainable development.

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Extraordinary Session event

This week the Nordic Council has decided to hold an extraordinary Session event on Monday 26 October from 16:00 to 17:30. The discussion will be opened by Jean-Christophe  Dumont from  the OECD’s  international immigration department and  Roderick Parkes, senior analyst for migration and internal affairs at the European Union Institute for Security Studies.

The event is open to the press, and the webcast can be followed here:

On 29 October, David Cameron will be coming to Iceland to meet with the Nordic and Baltic prime ministers.

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Nordic Council prize award ceremony

The winners of the Nordic Council prizes will be revealed on Tuesday 27 October. The award ceremony will take place at Harpa. The winners of the Nordic Council prizes for literature, children and young people’s literature, film, music, and the nature and environment prize will take part in a press conference and photo-call immediately after the award ceremony at the same venue.

Accreditation for journalists closes 23 October

Journalists wishing to attend the Nordic Council Session and award ceremony must be accredited no later than 23 October via this link.

The Nordic Council is the official body for Nordic inter-parliamentary co-operation. The autumn Session is the annual forum for political debate between the Council and the Nordic governments, represented in the Nordic Council of Ministers. The Session can be followed on Twitter using the hashtags #nrsession and #nrpol.