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The main attention was paid to the issues related to the Ukrainian domestic crisis. President of Russia Vladimir Putin told Sauli Niinistö about the results of his talks with US President Joseph Biden via videoconference on December 7, 2021, and made principled assessments of the developments regarding Ukraine. He emphasised the importance of the complete and unconditional fulfilment by Kiev of the Minsk Package of Measures.

The President of Russia noted, in part, that in violation of the Minsk agreements, the Ukrainian authorities are more and more obviously placing their bets on the use of force. Thus, they are using heavy weapons and attack drones in Donbass.

In this context, Vladimir Putin again stressed the importance of immediately starting talks with the United States and NATO. The goal of the talks would be to draft international legal security guarantees for Russia, ruling out NATO’s further movement eastward and the deployment of weapons systems threatening Russia in Ukraine and other adjacent states.

Vladimir Putin emphasised that this fully conformed to the principle of indivisible security sealed in the 1975 Helsinki Final Act and the 1999 Istanbul Charter. In this context, Vladimir Putin supported President Niinistö’s initiative to convene a summit in 2025 in honour of the 50^th anniversary of the Helsinki Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe.

A number of current bilateral issues were discussed. The leaders reaffirmed their striving to continue developing mutually beneficial cooperation, including trade and the economy. In addition, emphasis was laid on further cooperation in regional affairs, including in the north and the Arctic.

The leaders exchanged greetings in connection with the approaching New Year and Christmas holidays.