Tallinn - U.S. President Barack Obama will depart for Estonia on a state visit on Tuesday, Sept. 2.
He will reach Tallinn in the early hours of Wednesday, Sept. 3 and official events will take place on that day, the Estonian Foreign Ministry press service told Interfax.
Estonian President Toomas Hendrik Ilves will greet the U.S. President at the door of his residence, the Kadriorg Palace.
Obama will sign up in the guest of honor book and the presidents will hold negotiations and a joint press conference afterwards.
A meeting between Obama and Estonian Prime Minister Taavi Roivas will follow.
The U.S. president will also have a meeting with the Estonian, Latvian and Lithuanian leaders, Toomas Hendrik Ilves, Andris Berzins and Dalia Grybauskaite. The four presidents will make a statement for the press.
A public speech of Obama is also on the visit’s program.
The visit will focus on the NATO summit in Wales on Sept. 4-5, the Ukrainian situation and the request of the Baltic countries and Poland to bolster NATO’s military presence on their territories.
Estonian Foreign Minister Urmas Paet said earlier, “Security in Europe, new security patterns in Europe and further NATO activity in this context will be a subject of negotiations conducted by the U.S. president.”
In the words of Paet, Estonia has repeatedly invited Obama on a visit and the upcoming visit will be politically symbolic.
“It is politically symbolic that the U.S. president will come here directly from Washington and then go to the NATO summit in Wales,” the foreign minister said.
At the end of the visit, Obama and Roivas will meet with the U.S. servicemen stationed in Estonia and Estonian soldiers.
Unprecedented measures have been taken for the security of the very important guest. The Estonian government has allotted over 0.5 million euro for this purpose. Some 1,500-1,700 Estonian policemen and U.S. security service officers will be protecting Obama.
Estonia has put into place border control at seaports, airports and the land border for the period of Aug. 31 to Sept. 3 because of Obama’s visit.
