Finland and Sweden to continue on their path towards NATO
MINISTER for foreign affairs Pekka Haavisto (The Greens) reiterated on Saturday that Finland and Sweden continue their joint journey to NATO.
“My view is that neither country has reached the end of the road when it comes to NATO,” he formulated on YLE Ykkösaamu on Saturday. “My general assessment is that this is a time-out by Turkey and that we can return to the issue after the elections in Turkey [in May].”
Turkey last week broke off trilateral negotiations on the membership applications of Finland and Sweden, in response to the burning of a Koran outside its embassy in Stockholm by Rasmus Paluda, a Danish-Swedish far-right politician. Helsingin Sanomat revealed last week that the politician received support for his protest from Chang Fricka Swedish journalist who has collaborated with a subsidiary of the Russian state-controlled news network Russia Today.
Haavisto hinted in the aftermath of the incident that Finland is also considering what to do in the event that Turkey ratifies its application, but not Sweden’s. – We must of course investigate the situation. Has something happened that would prevent the Swedish venture from moving forward in the longer term?”
On Saturday, he continued to tone down his statement in an interview with the public service company by estimating that nothing irreversible has occurred. He declined to give a direct answer to the question of whether he could understand a circumstance where Finland joined NATO before Sweden.
“This is very speculative. Nothing like this is in sight at the moment,” he says.
He also said that there was no need to ask if the alliance could ratify the membership of Finland instead of both Finland and Sweden. Security in the Baltic Sea, he reminded, is perceived as a single entity among members of NATO.
“For NATO’s defense planning, Sweden will be a very important security component in the region,” he told YLE.
Finland and Sweden will also contribute to security in NATO, according to Haavisto. “We have had our own functioning defense and a large reserve all this time. Sweden also has advanced weapons technology. Finland and Sweden will promote security also in NATO and add their own rather strong defenses to this. Since we are not yet in NATO, we naturally lean towards our own defense.
President of Turkey Recep Tayyip Erdoğan on Sunday suggested that Turkey is ready to give the green light to Finland’s membership application, but not Sweden’s.
“If necessary, we can give a different message about Finland. Sweden will be shocked when we give the different message about Finland,” he says quoted saying at an Associated Press televised event.
“But Finland must not make the same mistake.”
Aleksi Teivainen – HT