First Minister Nicola Sturgeon has met Iceland’s Prime Minister during her two-day visit to Scotland.
Ms Sturgeon welcomed Katrin Jakobsdottir to Bute House in Edinburgh on Tuesday, with the pair discussing the relationship between the two countries and addressing key issues including Brexit and climate change.
The First Minister and Icelandic Prime Minister will be in attendance at a meeting of the Wellbeing Governments’ group on Wednesday.
READ MORE: Iain Macwhirter: Politicians should be wary when declaring a climate wary they cannot win
Delegates will discuss the importance of economic growth alongside the experiences and living conditions of communities.
Following the meeting on Tuesday, the First Minister said: “It was a pleasure to host the Prime Minister at Bute House.
“Our countries have a long history of friendship, with many historic and cultural ties.
“It was an opportunity to discuss the many areas where we have shared ambitions and challenges, such as our desire to grow sustainable tourism and take action to reduce and mitigate the effects of climate change.
“I also set out the Scottish Government’s position on Brexit and our determination that Scotland continues to play a full and active role in Europe.”
She added: “I look forward to working with the Icelandic government in the future on our common goals of promoting fair and equitable societies, where economic growth is matched by improved well-being.
“We will take that forward tomorrow with discussions at the Wellbeing Governments’ group meeting.”
Ms Jakobsdottir said: “Iceland and Scotland enjoy a long-standing relationship.
READ MORE: Derek Mackay accused of being in ‘full retreat’ on new currency
“I am delighted that we are now collaborating on the Wellbeing Economy Government project, in which Scotland has demonstrated an important leadership.
“We agree on the urgency of responding to climate change and we are committed to our collaboration on sustainable tourism.
“Scotland has also taken important initiatives in relation to gender based violence, not least image-based abuse and domestic violence, a development which we follow closely.”
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules here