The Minister of Defense takes two months of paternity leave due to NATO’s proposal | Finland
The Minister of Defense will leave his country on almost two months of paternity leave at the beginning of next year in an effort to join NATO, which his centrist party praised.
“We proudly support Antti Kaikkonen’s decision,” party leader and finance minister Annika Saarikko said. Kaikkonen will be off work from January 6 to the end of February.
“The opportunity to take and decide on family leave belongs to everyone,” Saarikko said.
Kaikkonen announced the birth of his second child in July.
“Kids are only little for a moment and I want to remember that in more than just photos,” she wrote on Twitter.
Children born in Finland before September 2022 are entitled to 54 days of paternity leave. About 80 percent of fathers in Finland take some paternity leave, the government said last year.
Several ministers have taken maternity leave during their current government tenure, but Kaikkonen is one of the first male ministers to take paternity leave. At the end of the 1990s, the then Prime Minister Paavo Lipponen took paternity leave in a pioneering move.
During Kaikkonen’s absence, he will be replaced by Mikko Savola, MP from the center.
“Savola has long and extensive experience and expertise in defense policy,” Kaikkonen said.
Finland and Sweden abandoned decades of military non-alignment and rushed to join NATO members in May after the Russian invasion of Ukraine. All 30 NATO member countries, with the exception of Hungary and Turkey, have ratified Finland’s accession, which requires unanimous approval.
Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán said in November that the country will accept Finland and Sweden joining NATO next year.
Turkey, for its part, has demanded that both countries take a tougher stance on Kurdish militants it considers terrorists before supporting its NATO efforts.