In particular, the willingness of the largest opposition parties – Basic Finns and the Coalition – to go it alone was high. However, many who thought so considered that ideally the countries would join the defense alliance hand in hand.
Instead, 30 lawmakers stated that the neighboring countries should join the defense alliance hand in hand. Nine of the respondents could not or did not want to give their opinion on the matter.
Many legislators who expressed their support for progress on their own justified their view on the long land border between Finland and Russia.
“We would be more vulnerable if Russia decided to attack Finland,” he wrote Kaisa Juuso (PS).
Timo Heinonen (NCP) emphasized that under no circumstances should Finland make its national security a condition for Sweden to join NATO or that Sweden’s “left-wing leadership wavers from its decision” to join NATO.
“If we face a situation where, for example, Turkey just ratifies Finland’s membership, we would naturally move forward as if we were slowing down at the expense of our security,” he wrote. Sari Sarcoma (NCP).
The opinions of members of the ruling party were more divided.
Juha PylväsThe chairman of the center’s parliamentary group saw Finland and Sweden applying for membership at the same time as a starting point. “It would give a really bad impression if Finland took action alone immediately in the face of adversity,” he commented.
“We are definitely not just at the pace of Sweden. We are not Turkey’s pawns,” he repeated Jukka Gustafsson (SDP).
The study was primarily conducted before the NATO summit in Madrid, Spain, on 28-30. June. On the first day of the summit, after nearly four hours of discussions, Finland, Sweden and Turkey signed a tripartite memorandum, which made it possible to grant invited status to Finland and Sweden. However, Turkey has continued to express reservations about membership applications and threatened to slow down the ratification process.
Experts have seen that its demands and accusations are aimed especially at Sweden.
On Tuesday, Canada, Denmark and Norway were the first three to ratify Finland’s and Sweden’s applications to NATO. Estonia is expected to do the same on Wednesday.
All 30 NATO member countries must ratify membership applications.
Aleksi Teivainen – HT
Source: The Nordic Page