Finland

Finland will join the US-led military alliance on Tuesday, bringing it formally inside Nato's mutual defence pact and reshaping northern Europe's security ...

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Authorities in Helsinki decided that in the wake of Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine in Feb. · Finland shares an 832-mile border with Russia, the longest ...

Formal accession nearly doubles Nato border with Russia as Moscow warns it will boost its defences if necessary.

The Nordic nation's decision to join the defense alliance is seen as a blow to Russian President Vladimir Putin, but the Stimson Center's Emma Ashford ...

Finnish leaders obviously felt that it was better to be inside the alliance and reduce that sort of risk of this limbo period even if Sweden weren't there. They fought a war against Russia in the 1930s and into the 1940s for their own self-defense against the Soviet Union, and they kept that up through the Cold War." Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov separately told reporters that Finland's accession to NATO was forcing Moscow to take countermeasures to ensure its security. Finland raced to join NATO after Russia's invasion of Ukraine last year. After years of public opposition to joining NATO inside Finland, polling now shows Finns embrace the move. At the ceremony, NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg announced, "For almost 75 years, this great alliance has shielded our nations and continues to do so today.

Perhaps most importantly, though, the country's accession cements the dramatic strategic shift that Russian President Vladimir Putin's invasion of Ukraine ...

[peace deal](https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2023/4/3/un-experts-accuse-senior-south-sudan-officials-of-rights-abuses) was signed in 2018 after nearly 400,000 people died. [military relations](https://foreignpolicy.com/2023/02/02/us-philippines-military-bases-lloyd-austin-china-taiwan-war/) have grown in the last few months. On Monday, the [location](https://www.cnn.com/2023/04/04/asia/us-philippines-military-base-access-intl-hnk-ml/index.html) of those new bases was identified. And current Israeli Prime Minister [Benjamin Netanyahu](https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2023/03/31/world-leaders-indicted-trump/) has been under indictment since 2019 on corruption charges. In the last 15 years alone, two French presidents, two South Korean presidents, and one Italian prime minister were found guilty of [corruption](https://www.nytimes.com/2023/03/31/world/trump-world-leaders-indicted.html). And for the first time, a non-American is joining the A-team: Canadian Joseph Monytuil is among the top leaders said to be responsible for state-sanctioned killings in August 2022. 2, the two nations announced a deal increasing Washington’s access to military bases on the island from five to nine locations, an [expansion](https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2023/2/2/philippines-set-to-allow-wider-us-access-to-military-bases) of the 2014 Enhanced Defense Cooperation Agreement. But as Robbie Gramer reported for FP Insider, fresh after an evening with the Finnish Diplomatic Sauna Society, NATO headquarters just [installed](https://www.politico.eu/article/finland-sauna-culture-diplomacy-brussels/) its own steamy room. In the meantime, Finns and Western allies alike are celebrating adding Helsinki to the group. By adding Finland, the trans-Atlantic bloc doubles its border with Russia, expands the alliance’s F-35 stealth fighter program, and becomes home to one of the world’s three major 5G infrastructure providers. It’s a historic day for the world’s largest military alliance.

Finland's national flag was raised at NATO headquarters, a deeply symbolic moment and a stark display of the shifting global dynamics.

The leader of the conservative National Coalition party (NCP), Petteri Orpo, is likely to be the next prime minister. And while it is possible that he will ...

“There are 10 parties in the Finnish parliament now; there are 13 in the Netherlands,” says Henley. At the same time, classic centre-left parties are seeing their vote share hold up above disastrous levels, “but that has to be put in the context of where they were a decade ago”, says Henley. “After the pandemic and the war, the economy has come back to the forefront,” says Henley. “But the crucial question about the direction of his government is who he goes into coalition with.” It’s about post-pandemic worry and the economy trumping everything else.” While Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is a huge issue in Finland – and the reason behind its new membership of Nato – it was not a point of disagreement in the election. “Whichever way Orpo turns, forming a government is going to be tricky,” says Henley. [increased its vote share and number of MPs](https://ablink.editorial.theguardian.com/ss/c/anB5BDNDuHMZ3XJHP1YCbtqgiIEaDNS-MUSN1b6S6GrnOk2ItE2kri4TPc3sVWAbpZw72wJlfWBWWWWQlK-7uE4vh2zLg6S0KHbzJCOq8SonVXHxbGRhF_vWxZelCbCeNVK99QdcXI-b9h0fQjHsIAH51OeNtZ3bDNG_mds1URKAzv17QOwS2sII_K5C5MEgfYFri9nmtdNXOa42LCbFuqI_kzhR-h9k9ug4DNObodzz9h2D4ZtLsVb4yxPUqGA6/3v2/Akj6wBtzRray9fKkkv0MIg/h44/-YlXsYqWWHdJozZj6Kc6AO846LI36xTz7EfJEBCBbVw). The 53-year-old has led the NCP since 2016, was deputy prime minister between 2017 and 2019, and has held several government ministries, winning praise for his handling of a tenfold increase in asylum seeker arrivals in 2015. “It made her fans more enthusiastic, and her enemies more critical,” says Jon Henley, the Guardian’s Europe correspondent. The leader of the conservative National Coalition party (NCP), Petteri Orpo, is likely to be the next prime minister. [in Finland this century](https://ablink.editorial.theguardian.com/ss/c/H-OBEvjgYS-9yWUKxZaRp2XzjHIRu3DBOiyxgtg_8W3jl9eWLGSNErpItzcp5qTvIhocIy998gav3xCPpWXl4YtiImEp9fXYsoZP3C4KCLQWAo7xtqGJpwX7GjKaym6T58CECZ1R82VaAyyVV0Z6nE8i8Jj1SQfFUl1HQ-0e07FX5PVCnWKXaTAoZ3djPRCQgdOUBjWq3WFY3DahT8XNVQ/3v2/Akj6wBtzRray9fKkkv0MIg/h41/YNpqh-r15gg1-izQKdAjF0X0sWrG-xlhV6hWeO9mOQc).

On this historic day as we mark the 74th anniversary of NATO, we also welcome Finland as NATO's 31st Ally. Finland is stronger and safer within the Alliance, ...

The selling points of the bed-and-breakfast are its century-old buildings, its spacious rooms and its proximity to Russia, a short cross-country ski trip to ...

Pasi Kuoppamäki, the chief economist at Danske Bank, has voiced his reservations about the extent of fiscal adjustment pursued by the National Coalition.

In a whirlwind 48 hours, Finland's progressive young Prime Minister Sanna Marin has been ousted in the country's parliamentary elections, and Finland has ...

Finland's membership into the world's largest military alliance has dealt a major blow to Vladimir Putin, with NATO's border with Russia expanding by ...

The United States and other NATO members led the calls for Sweden to join as soon as Finland's flag was fluttering in the cold Brussels breeze. Despite some bolshy rhetoric from Moscow, Professor Sussex said the response to Finland and Sweden's NATO bid was "fairly muted". Though the alliance says it poses no threat to Moscow, the Russian Foreign Ministry warned that "it will be forced to take military-technical and other retaliatory measures" to a move that marks "a fundamental change in the situation in Northern Europe, which had previously been one of the most stable regions in the world". "I don't think there are too many circumstances we need to send large sums of NATO troops to Finland simply because the Finnish military is extremely strong," Professor Sussex said. "That border will be the kind of fortified one." As the border runs more or less in a straight line with no rivers or lakes running through, Professor Sussex said Finland is likely to further militarise the area.

Finland's outgoing Prime Minister Sanna Marin is stepping down as leader of the Social Democratic party, she said on Wednesday, adding she will serve as a ...

Marin sought another term as Finland's leader in last Sunday's election but her party HELSINKI, April 5 (Reuters) - Finland's outgoing Prime Minister Sanna Marin is stepping down as leader of the Social Democratic party, she said on Wednesday, adding she will serve as a regular lawmaker in the newly elected parliament from next week. Finland's Marin steps down as party leader

Marin says she hopes to be able to live “a slightly more peaceful life” in the future.

Marin said she hopes to be able to live “a slightly more peaceful life” in the future. “Now is the time to get in line again and leave the chairman’s place,” Marin, 37, said during a news conference in Helsinki. Marin has won praise, among other things, for steering Finland through the Covid-19 pandemic and championing Finland’s Nato bid together with President Sauli Niinisto, and for being a staunch supporter of Ukraine in its war with Russia.

Outgoing Finnish Prime Minister Sanna Marin said Wednesday she would resign as Social Democrat party leader. “Now it's time to join the ranks again and step ...

She will continue to sit as a Social Democrat parliamentarian. [third](https://www.politico.eu/article/finland-election-pm-sanna-marin-defeat-national-vote/) in the election, behind the center-right National Coalition Party and the anti-immigration Finns Party. [defeated](https://www.politico.eu/article/petteri-orpo-finland-election-win-hard-work-new-government-coalition-sanna-marin/) in a national election on Sunday, will be replaced by a new party leader at the next party congress in September, she added.

A historian looks at the steps leading up to Finland joining the Western strategic alliance – and what that means for small nations elsewhere.

Even Finland has abandoned it; neutral Sweden is now anxious to join the Western alliance; and other states, even Switzerland, are questioning the efficacy of nonalignment in a polarized world. [swung between a pro-Russian orientation](https://theconversation.com/ukraine-war-follows-decades-of-warnings-that-nato-expansion-into-eastern-europe-could-provoke-russia-177999) favored in eastern Ukraine, and a more Ukrainian nationalist identity powerfully evident in western Ukraine. [rules-based order](https://www.lowyinstitute.org/the-interpreter/what-does-rules-based-order-mean)” that the United States and its NATO allies have touted as the best way to run the world is changing – attracting some, yet more suspicious in the eyes of [nations not privy](https://www.brookings.edu/research/the-united-states-china-and-the-new-non-aligned-countries/) to club membership. And the European Union offered Ukraine closer economic and political ties, stirring up fears in Moscow that this was the first step toward NATO. And federalism, which would have required that some decision-making be handed to regional governments, was considered suspect as a viable form of statehood by many in Ukraine and Russia alike. With Russia’s invasion of Ukraine a year ago, decision-makers in Helsinki have seemingly driven the final nails into the coffin of Finlandization. For centuries it has had to consider its own interests in conjunction with – and in accommodation of – those of its gigantic neighbor: czarist Russia, then the Soviet Union and today Vladimir Putin’s Russia. Similarly, even before the invasion last year, Russia was a problem for Ukraine, with authorities in Kyiv fearing dominance from the East. The price for maintaining its democratic state and capitalist economy in domestic affairs during the Cold War was Finlandization. It underscores just how the Russian invasion of Ukraine has [upset global realities](https://theconversation.com/ukraine-war-has-exposed-the-folly-and-unintended-consequences-of-armed-missionaries-197609) long thought settled, at least by the Western powers. and the West over global affairs and seek a system in which [power is distributed regionally](https://theconversation.com/ukraine-war-has-exposed-the-folly-and-unintended-consequences-of-armed-missionaries-197609), with Moscow and Beijing holding sway over what they they see as their parts of the world. In the world of geopolitics, great powers make, break and play by their own rules.

She is to continue on as a regular MP in the newly elected parliament starting next week.

Marin sought another term as Finland's leader in last Sunday's election but her party came third behind the right-wing National Coalition and the Finns parties. While historically most Finns favored neutrality, practically all parties have adjusted their stance regarding joining NATO following the Russian invasion of Ukraine. While personally popular especially with the younger voters, the outgoing PM's government faced criticism over growing welfare spending.

With war in Ukraine dominating discussion at the NATO foreign ministers meeting this week, Global Insider sat down with Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba ...

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