To wipe out bad credit, a stress test is needed for the largest financial institutions, says Vanhanen, who is attending the spring EU summit in Brussels. He feels that this message needs to be sent to the G-20 summit to be held in early April.

In Vanhanen’s view, pumping more money into economic stimulus is not the right way to fight a recession. Instead, he calls for going into the core of the crisis by cleaning away bad credit.

At the summit, Finland favours providing considerable additional credit to the International Monetary Fund, so that the IMF could more easily help countries suffering from the financial crisis.

Finland Raises Global Warming

Finland argues that in spite of the difficulties, the current Doha round of trade talks need to be continued. The government also says that the EU should hold on to its promises for reducing greenhouse emissions, and to commit to help poor countries with significant financial support, so that they can make environmental investments.

EU leaders agreed on Thursday to tighten financial rules, lend some 55 billion euros to the International Monetary Fund, and invest about five billion in energy and telecommunications infrastructure.

In addition to Vanhanen, Finance Minister Jyrki Katainen and Foreign Minister Alexander Stubb are taking part in the summit.