site.btaUPDATED President Radev Is in Riga for Three Seas Initiative Summit and Business Forum

President Rumen Radev is in Riga, Latvia, Monday to participate in the Three Seas Initiative (3SI) Summit and Business Forum on the invitation of his counterpart Egils Levits.

Radev will take part in a presidents' panel with the participation also of high-level representatives of the twelve 3SI countries and the initiative's strategic partners from the European Commission, Germany, and the US. He is among the participants in a discussion on the security environment impacted by the war in Ukraine and the new challenges facing the countries in the region, and is also scheduled to hold bilateral meetings.

Established in 2015, the 3SI is a politically inspired, commercially driven platform for improving connectivity between twelve EU Member States allocated between Baltic, Adriatic and Black seas. Strategic partners of the initiative are the European Commission, Germany and the US.

The Latvian presidency has set itself the objective of implementing the practical dimensions of cooperation between the 3SI countries in order to ensure security and real connectivity in the region in a sustainable way.

So far, the Initiative has had six summits: in 2016 in Dubrovnik, 2017 in Warsaw, 2018 in Bucharest, 2019 in Ljubljana, 2020 in Tallinn and 2021 in Sofia. 

On 8 and 9 July 2021, President Rumen Radev hosted the sixth summit in the Bulgarian capital Sofia. During the forum, he held a number of bilateral meetings, including with Slovenian President Borut Pahor, Polish President Andrzej Duda, and Croatian Prime Minister Andrej Plenkovic.

Connectivity in science, education, technology and innovation was highlighted as an important priority.