Kersti Kaljulaid Quotes
-
I am very worried about politicians who know that their countries are greatly benefiting financially and at the same time are saying that the European Union is not good for us. The message has to be coherent.
-
There are high hopes of France and what they're trying to achieve there by liberalising the labour market and other reforms. You lose some, you gain some.
-
We are past the stage in our relations that you come to Washington with an empty goody bag and then you go back with a bag filled with stuff.
-
Digital society is born when your people refuse to use paper. And in our country, we know that our people refuse to use paper. If you arrive at such a point in your development, you have to make your digital state always secure.
-
Traditionally, nations have harnessed taxpayers to their territory by making almost all social guarantees dependent on working in one country, every day, every month, and for at least three decades. In creating free movement of people, this web has only got more complex but never disappeared.
-
People everywhere in the world have Russian connections. There is nothing wrong with having Russian connections as long as you're transparent about it.
-
Our main concern will always be security.
-
Too many people in the world associate democracy with their ability to go and buy more and more every year. I come from a country where it's much more popular to remind people that democracy is available at every income level, and this is something which you need to protect.
-
We have every reason to put our trust in NATO and in transatlantic cooperation.
-
In 2008, when Russia attacked Georgia, Western countries took it as an isolated incident, but probably this was the start of the push against our underlying international security architecture. And this push then started a landslide which in 2014 resulted in Crimean occupation.
-
Estonians are much more used to Internet banking rather than an online credit card.
-
Not everything is so bad... Whichever way you look at it, we feel that we can face the future when the liberal, democracy-based world sticks together. We have great trust that it will.
-
As the president of Estonia, I represent the only truly digital society which actually has a state; almost all our citizens' interactions with the government, including voting, can be done securely online, and our 'e-residents' can incorporate and run their businesses in Estonia without ever having to set foot here.
-
In Estonia, the Russian minority can move freely, travel freely, work anywhere in Europe.
-
In Estonia, our greatest national treasure is our egalitarian educational system.
-
Small nations have no time for small goals - they have to think big in order to become contributors.
-
Sometimes I hear, particularly from Russia, that we simply hate Russia and don't like to co-operate, that we are hysterical about the risks. But this is totally untrue. We would greatly benefit economically if our neighbour was a democratic, developing country.
-
We've had Vice President Pence visiting Tallinn, where he met not only with me but also with my other Baltic colleagues - Lithuanian President Ms. Grybauskaite and Latvian President Mr. Vejonis. And, of course, Vice President Pence has been very clear that NATO acts as a whole. Attack against one is attack against all.
-
I don't know of any problems countries in Europe are facing - environment, infrastructure, markets, market development, the fifth freedom being digital freedom, border security, terrorism, migration - that can be better solved alone.
-
Everybody has the right to decide their own fate.
-
Every state aspiring to be part of the free world, able to decide its own destiny, deserves its chance. They may, in a not too distant future, contribute to all of us in ways we cannot imagine today.
-
Estonia maintains a two-language school system. I don't know many countries in the world that provide a system like ours. We are making sure that our Russian-speaking minority feels comfortable and involved in this country.
-
The E.U. is a common platform where we come together and agree to do certain things. But the E.U. is never going to take over the responsibility which governments have for prosperity and security of their people.
-
Governments don't want to be the last ones in the digital sphere if their people and businesses are already there. We have to make clear that the free movement of services in the E.U. also applies in the digital sphere. The shortcut is to create a digital union.