It went very quickly. Last Thursday, the President and Prime Minister of Finland said they were in favor of the country’s “immediate” accession to NATO (North Atlantic Treaty Organization). Parliament “validated” this line on Tuesday by an overwhelming majority (188 votes for, 8 against).
“Being a member of NATO would strengthen Finland’s security,” said President Sauli Niinistö and Prime Minister Sanna Marin.
The executive’s official position marks the tipping point of the Finnish line, which shares a 1,300 km border with Russia and a painful past with its powerful neighbor. The invasion of Ukraine by Russia on February 24 quickly turned Finnish public opinion and political leaders, who had hitherto been attached to the country’s neutrality.
Sweden also intends to abandon its neutrality to benefit from the shield of the Atlantic alliance, and could quickly announce a candidacy.
Read alsoFinland, Sweden … How is the process of joining NATO going?
On Monday, Vladimir Putin reacted to these announcements. Such “enlargement of NATO does not constitute an immediate threat (…) but the deployment of military infrastructures on the territories of these countries will of course lead to a response”, affirmed the Russian president during a summit of a regional military alliance in the Kremlin. This reaction seems quite restrained, while Moscow considers the presence of NATO in its neighborhood as an existential threat, and that the Kremlin had notably launched its offensive against Ukraine because of its Atlanticist ambitions.
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