The Turku Europe Forum has once again broken its previous records, bringing together over 1,500 decision-makers, experts and members of the public at the Turku City Theatre from 26 to 28 August 2026.
In addition, around 1,200 members of the public attended the public event at Hansatori, and the live stream attracted nearly 11,000 views during the event. There were 51 programme items and over 220 speakers – the highest numbers in the Forum’s history.
The next Europe Forum will be held at the new Turku Music Centre Fuuga and the Turku City Theatre from 25 to 27 August 2027, when the Europe Forum will celebrate its 10th anniversary.
Discussions at the Forum focused in particular on values, innovation and security as the foundations of the EU’s success. Prime Minister Petteri Orpo delivered the opening address at the Europe Forum.
– The Europe Forum has established itself at the forefront of the Finnish debate on Europe and, year on year, brings more and more people together to listen and discuss. This is truly essential, because we are Europeans and our prosperity, well-being and security are built together, within a united European Union. I cannot think of a better venue for this event than Turku,’ said Orpo.
Henna Virkkunen, First Vice-President of the European Commission, also shared her views at the forum on the elements that will shape the future of a sovereign Europe, and how Europe’s security and competitiveness at the forefront of the world can be ensured.
– The top priority for Europe is that we ourselves have the capacity to take responsibility for our own security and defence, and that we are not so heavily reliant on the support of others. Linked to this are technologies that form a significant part of international trade, the economy, social power and also security. We must have the ability to control the technologies we use and our own data, so that this does not involve any risky dependencies,’ Virkkunen states.
Over the past nine years, the Europe Forum has grown into an ever-larger event, attracting an increasing number of young people.
– The Europe Forum is also very much in tune with the times. This time, the focus was very much on both security and the EU’s competitiveness. It’s also nice to see that the discussions were primarily aimed at finding solutions. It will be interesting to see what topics are discussed next year, says Matti Anttonen, Chair of the Europe Forum in Turku Association.
All programme recordings from the forum are available to watch online
All programmes from the Europe Forum will be available to watch later as video recordings on the Europe Forum’s YouTube channel.
Recordings of the live streams are already available to watch as daily recordings on the event’s live page, including versions with English interpretation.
