The Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Photo – Lehtikuva.
Finland is planning to close embassies in Luxemburg, Slovakia and Slovenia by the end of 2015 as part of cost cutting measures, announced the Finnish Ministry of Foreign Affairs on Wednesday.
Following the closure of the three embassies, Finland's relations with Luxembourg, Slovakia and Slovenia will be taken care by embassies in Belgium, Czech Republic and Croatia respectively.
In addition, Finland's temporary contact office in Beirut, Lebanon, will be upgraded to an embassy, among others.
Many measures have been taken to improve efficiency of operations both in the ministry and at diplomatic missions abroad, said the ministry.
After the changes, Finland will have 89 diplomatic missions in 69 countries around the world.
It was agreed during budget draft negotiation that Ministry's expenses in the future should be scaled, so that it would not necessary to make further restrictions on the mission network.
Over half of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs budget was spent on the maintenance of foreign mission networks abroad.
