-We need to reconsider our security policy, Finnish Foreign Minister Alexander Stubb said in an interview with Austria’s Die Presse on Saturday, EUobserver.com reports. -The talk about how nothing has changed is inconceivable to me, the minister added.
Meanwhile, in Sweden government coalition junior partner, the People’s Party, steps up rhetoric for Swedish membership in the alliance.
The pro-NATO statements come as the two neutral countries increasingly open up for defence cooperation with other states. Recently, both countries have engaged in enhanced defence cooperation talks with NATO member Norway. As reported by BarentsObserver, a report on Nordic defence cooperation is currently in the making under the leadership of Norway’s former foreign minister Thorvald Stoltenberg. The report’s likely conclusion is that the Nordic countries should step up cross-border military cooperation, both in order to cut costs and in order to meet joint challenges in the region.
Russia will not however welcome new NATO members along its borders, be it in the Caucasus or in the European North. Several prominent Russian politicians have been outspoken about negative consequences of Finnish and Swedish membership in the alliance.
As reported by newspaper Helsingin Sanomat a Russian diplomat working based in Helsinki in a television interview said that Russia would see Finland’s possible membership in NATO as “a direct military threat”. The statement from Mr. Vladimir Kozin caused something of a political storm in Finland last autumn. Russia officially distanced itself from Kozin’s comments, and he soon returned to Moscow. Still, the statement illustrates the sensitivity of the NATO issue in east-west relations in the region.
