2020
Finland and Latvia agreed on developing an armoured vehicle system – a Patria vehicle chassis platform chosen for the development in-progress
On 29 January 2020, Finland and Latvia signed a Technical Arrangement on launching a development programme for sustained army mobility enhancement. Finland’s Minister of Defence Antti Kaikkonen and Latvia’s Minister of Defence Artis Pabriks signed the document for the participating nations.
The cooperation programme aims to develop a common armoured wheeled vehicle system. In case this development leads to vehicle system procurement in the future, the resulting common system enhances mobility, cost-efficiency, interoperability and security of supply of the armies of the participating nations.
-At this
stage, this is cooperation between Finland and Latvia, but the following phases
allow also other countries to join the cooperation programme. This sets an
excellent example of deepening defence cooperation between EU member states,
Defence Minister Kaikkonen said at the signing event.
With the Letter of Intent signed in December, Estonia together with
Latvia and Finland has shown interests for acquiring armoured vehicles for
their national armed forces. Based on
national and multinational tests and evaluations, the vehicle chassis platform
chosen for the development in-progress is a Finnish-made Patria 6x6 armoured
wheeled vehicle chassis platform that meets the set capability requirements.
As the programme advances, public information on its progress will be released on a regular basis.
For further information on the programme, please contact, at the Ministry of Defence, Senior Legal Advisor Juha Sepponen, tel. +358 295 140 044, and Head of Materiel Unit, Governmental Councellor Tarja Jaakkola, tel. +358 295 140 410, and at the Army Command, Inspector of the Infantry, Colonel Rainer Peltoniemi, tel. +358 299 800 (FDF switchboard).