Prime Minister Juha Sipilä says that while Finland cannot now help France militarily, it could help France in crisis management operations such as in Mali.
Following the Friday the 13th attacks, France became the first country state to invoke the EU's mutual-defence clause. However current Finnish laws prohibit it from providing direct military assistance in Syria for instance.
Iraq and Med also on the cards
The Finnish premier said that other support measures could include an extension of the country's military presence in the Mediterranean and in training operations in Northern Iraq.
Sipilä said that such moves would help France, as it would help free up its resources now tied up in overseas operations. For the same reason, other EU states including Ireland are considering sending troops to Mali, whose capital was hit by a deadly hotel attack on Friday.
Finland is drafting a legislative reform that would allow it to provide military aid to countries asking for security support. Sipilä noted that military assistance can also include crisis management duties, on which Finland is now ready to proceed.
Deadliest peacekeeping zone
Finland is now taking part in UN operations in Liberia, Ethiopia and Eritrea, NATO-led operations in Afghanistan and Kosovo, and EU programmes in the Mediterranean and Iraq. It has also recently participated in operations in Chad, Somalia and the Central African Republic.
France has had forces in Mali since an Islamic insurgency in 2013. The BBC reported on Friday that the UN's MINUSMA operation in Mali has been the organisation's deadliest in recent years, with 53 international peacekeepers killed there in the past three years.
"Risk scenario" on Finnish-Russian border
Sipilä also commented on President Sauli Niinistö's statement earlier on Friday that Finland should prepare for the prospect of more migrants arriving on its eastern border with Russia following Norway's moves to limit the number of refugees arriving via an Arctic route across northern Russia.
The PM said that Finnish authorities are monitoring the situation in cooperation with their Russian counterparts. Sipilä acknowledged that "one risk scenario is that pressure will also increase on the eastern border." He stressed that surveillance of the eastern border has worked well, and that only a few dozen asylum seekers have arrived via Russia while thousands have entered on the western border with Sweden.