Finland says they are in no hurry to join NATO before Sweden

The Finnish authorities plan to wait until the NATO countries approve Sweden’s application to join the alliance before joining it themselves, transmits newspaper Aftonbladets with reference to the Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Republic Pekka Haavisto.

Before the start of the People and Defense conference, the head of the Finnish Foreign Ministry said that Finland and Sweden would complete the process of joining the North Atlantic Alliance together.

“Finland is in no hurry to join NATO as soon as possible, so that it would be impossible to wait for Sweden to receive approval,” Haavisto said.

At a conference on January 8, Swedish Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson also said that Stockholm could not fulfill a number of demands from Turkey, which blocked the applications of the two countries to NATO.

“From time to time, Turkey mentions persons they want to be extradited from Sweden. Then I said that these issues are resolved within the framework of Swedish law,” the politician said, adding that Swedish citizens will never be extradited to another country. NATO membership talks, however, are going “very well” between Sweden, Finland and Turkey, he added.

Finland and Sweden applied to join NATO in mid-May last year against the backdrop of Russia’s special operation in Ukraine. At the end of June, the NATO leadership decided to invite these two countries to the alliance. On December 4, the Finnish Foreign Ministry explained that Moscow’s nuclear rhetoric was a key factor that prompted Finland to apply to join NATO.

The only countries that have not yet approved the membership of Finland and Sweden in the alliance are Hungary and Turkey. In December, Haavisto revealed that Hungary promised to ratify the applications in February 2023.

Also in early November, NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg called on Turkey to ratify the agreements on the entry of Sweden and Finland into the alliance, since, according to him, the countries have fulfilled all the requirements put forward by Ankara. Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu, in turn, disagreed with NATO Secretary General.

Prior to this, the foreign ministers of the three countries signed a memorandum of understanding confirming Turkey’s support for the countries’ accession to NATO. Turkey, according to President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, got everything it wanted in the negotiations: in particular, Finland and Sweden agreed to full cooperation in the fight against the PKK and its offshoots and to lift the embargo on the supply of defense industry products. At a press conference following the NATO summit in Madrid, Erdogan said that Sweden had committed to extradite Turkey 73 people who, according to the Turkish government, are involved in terrorist activities.

In early December, Haavisto announced that the Finnish government had submitted a NATO membership bill to parliament.