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Stubb to be Finland's new Prime Minister

Finland's new Prime Minister Alexander Stubb. Here from his visit to Murmansk in 2009 as Foreign Minister when he declared the north to be the sexiest region in the world.

Alexander Stubb, famous in the Barents Region for branding the north as the world´s most sexy region, is put on track to take over after Jyrki Katainen.

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Jyrki Katainen will step down as Prime Minister by the end of this month. On Saturday, Finland´s ruling Conservative Party elected current EU Affairs Minister Alexander Stubb as new leader.

As leader of the ruling party in the coalition government, Stubb will also take over the Prime Minister post.

Prime Minister Jyrki Katainen.

Alexander Stubb was previously Finland´s Foreign Minister and became well known after his opening speech at the Barents Euro Arctic Council meeting in Murmansk in October 2009 when he declared “the north to be one of the sexiest areas in the world.”

Present around the table when Stubb made the statement was Russia’s Sergey Lavrov, Norway’s Jonas Gahr Støre and Sweden’s Carl Bildt. Alexander Stubb was not the only former Barents Foreign Minister from the Murmansk meeting that was elected party leader on Saturday. In Norway, Jonas Gahr Støre was unanimously elected head of the Labour Party after Jens Stoltenberg that is appointed to be the next Secretary General of NATO.

The new Finnish Prime Minister, Alexander Stubb, is known to be strongly pro-EU and he wants neutral Finland to join NATO.