Helsinki / TEH: Finland’s European Affairs Minister Titi Toborainen announced that her country’s request to join the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) has become “very likely.”
This came after Finland’s Prime Minister Sanna Marin said, last week, that “joining and not joining NATO are two options that have consequences.”
Marin added at the Time UK: “We will have very careful discussions, but we will not take more time than we need,” indicating the possibility of “the end of discussions before midsummer” with the date of the NATO summit expected next June in Madrid.
And on Monday, the British newspaper “The Times ” revealed that Finland and Sweden are preparing to join NATO by next summer.
Finnish leaders agreed to remain neutral during the Cold War in exchange for guarantees from Russia that it would not invade. Finland, with a population of 5.5 million, remained militarily non-aligned, in part to avoid provoking its eastern neighbor, which is separated by a 1,300 km border.
The change in the positions of Finland and Sweden about joining NATO came against the backdrop of Russia’s attack on Ukraine and its threat to neighboring countries with a similar fate if they contemplate joining NATO and abandoning neutrality.
For its part, Moscow warned against Finland and Sweden from joining the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO). The Eastern Herald online magazine .
In an article published on his Telegram channel, former Russian President Dmitry Medvedev announced that when two more countries join the alliance (NATO), Russia will have two more “officially registered” adversaries, and the length of the land border of the alliance with Russia will double.
He said that Russia should “act calmly and without emotion”, and should strengthen the borderline with NATO, strengthen its ground forces and air defense system, and deploy naval forces in the Gulf of Finland.
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